P90x food plan phase i fat shredder,

Hello everyone, first of all English isn't my first language, I'm on mobile, and I tend to ramble, so I'm sorry about that. I (34F) am in a short relationship (4 months) with L (28M), he's very kind and sweet, and I'm still adapting to this whole new relationship thing, for this last sentence I'll give you some background. My last serious relationship lasted for 3,5 years between me (24F at the time) and F (21M at the time). It started after we matched on a dating app and we went on our first date. Our first date was crazy perfect, he picked me up on a garden and we went to a tattoo/piercing shop where we got pierced. We talked for hours until evening, and he invited me to eat pizza at his place with his dad lol. It was super late by then, and I lived far far away, so we slept together just cuddling, nothing else. Since then we would meet each other every day. One time (6 months into the relationship) he rear ended another vehicle while going back home. So I decided to move closer to him, because the commute was getting to us. So I did. One week into the new lease, I had an accident and broke my ankle. So he decided that it was better for me to stay at his place to recover (bigger house, access to vehicles, and accessible in general). Three months and two surgeries after I decided it was time for me to go home, but he would convince me to "postpone just one more week" every time, and I would always oblige (I know the little doormat I sometimes am). And things would go like that until I hit the one year mark into that lease. And I said to him "or I move back home or I move definitely here, there's no middle therm", so I moved into his place. I offered to pay rent but he refused. Until this moment the relationship was perfect, his father also lived at that place, and we would always cook together, sing together, go for short trips, etc. But after a while I started to have symptoms of anxiety and depression. Until one day I had a panic attack by just sitting in front of my computer at work. I started to treat that and the doctors said I would have to stop work for a bit, because it was super serious (I don't want to go into too much details for that). At the beginning he was super supportive, but now I know that to have a relationship with someone w/ depression and anxiety it's super hard, 0/10 not recommend. So he and his friends started to be petty to me, and I noticed. One day me, him and his friend went for dinner and I got catchup for me. His friends started to berate me on how catchup is bad for my health and that I should stop using it. I simple replied that every time I see him he is smoking his cigarettes and I never said nothing. Or one time that his friend started to talk bad about gold digger women and insinuate that I was one, because I wasn't working. Before stopping to work I had a career in IT, while my bf had an assistant warehouse job, and I used to earn way more than him (that was never important to me before, honestly). So I said "I know I'm not working, but as soon as I get better I'll earn 4 times more than my bf, so your argument doesn't apply". Just wanted to point out that I had my savings, and I was living off it, paying for food, and other bills. My bf then was very mean and cold to me too, and at one point I asked "Do you want me to move out?" and he said "yes". "After that will you break up with me?" And he said "yes". So I activated my survival mode, and started to work my way into leaving. Between that, and getting a job, I started to pack my things quietly, and applying for jobs. All that while mourning the relationship. For him, I was doing nothing, but I was actually already in the way of signing a new lease, going to interviews and packing my things (and hiding in the house), I wanted to just disappear, I felt humiliated to not be able to leave in the next day after that talk. One day he went after me for sex, and I said "don't be like that, I feel like a piece of meat", he answered "so I'm going downstairs to get some salt then", and from that moment on, all the good feelings I had were replaced by disgust and disdain. A couple days after he asked me what I was going to do on next weekend, because he would go on a trip and wouldn't be home, and I said "nothing". I actually went to help the landlord to clean and paint the new place, since I wanted it to be ready ASAP. And I could move in next Wednesday. When I broke the news to him, he looked surprised and said "already??". So I kinda moved all out in less than a day. After that he would always go after me. I was 27 by then, and from that moment on the idea of a relationship would always make me sick. So I had the crazy teenager phase (since I always had long relationships before) and decided that I would be alone. I started to draw a plan to move to New Zealand, as far away from my ex possible and the plans didn't go through. But 3 years later I moved to Europe, my ex would always send messages saying he missed me, even when he was on a relationship, and in one of my birthdays he sent me a picture from his wallet with my picture in it. I replied politely, but I felt disdain honestly. We haven't talked in years now, honestly, and I'm alright with that. I was single for 7 years icking the idea of going through all that again. Ok, so now, what's happening? I'm 34 now, and I have my cute sweet new boyfriend, and every time he comes here to sleep with me I dream that I sneak out the bed to sleep with my ex. Even though I would never do that, even if he was in other bed next to us. I always feel guilty and dirty, like I'm cheating. I spend the days thinking that I should tell my bf, but I don't want to hurt him. All I feel for my ex is disdain and ick. But I feel like I'm hiding something. What do I do?
TL;DR!: Every time my bf sleeps over, I dream that I sneak out of the bed to go to sleep with my ex, and my brain thinks I'm cheating.

I’ve never written a question on this app before but this is eating at me. BUCKLE UP THIS IS LONG!
So my husband’s family have been abusive to him, he is the black sheep of his family he is the youngest and has a different father than his older siblings (8,6 years older).
Ever since I started dating him I was antagonized in some way. When I first met his family for Christmas his middle brother invited his ex-girlfriend to hang out, unbeknownst to my then bf which was awkward but she was fine with me. My boyfriend then was really sick and I took the train 2 hours to pick him up from his home (where his family was with their cars) and take him to a hospital in London. He was there for 6 days not one person visited him but me. They made fun of him and minimized his illness.
Then we moved to my home country the US and eloped. They came to visit a few years later his mom and eldest brother were okay. Middle brother again constantly throwing barbs and digs at me completely unprovoked. I get there may be a culture difference they are White English conservatives, I’m African American. Shortly after we married he dated a black girl, who left bc she was also treated poorly. Some examples of digs; I congratulated him on graduating and asked him when he finished he replied “same time you were supposed to” (I dropped out). Then I asked what the he loved most and what was challenging about being a PT and he replied “no offense, working with fat people.” Took them to multiple meals and covered everything which wasn’t cheap, he complained about the food being “reheated” and bitched when he was ID’d.
Things get progressively worse, middle brother has a precious baby. I want to spoil her and become close with the mother of the child (who is not with him due to his creepy behavior). We form a fast friendship and chat all the time about the baby. My brother in-law tortures this girl denies he is the dad but also goes out of his way to bully her (she’s not breast feeding right, she shouldn’t have pacifiers) all from the comfort of his home. He is also constantly complaining about having to pay $50 a week in child support nonstop saying he is going “bankrupt”. My hubby is part of a group chat and my mother-in-law talks ish about my friend and my hubby is telling me. I ask to see and his brother is actively trying to give his soon to be 1 year old daughter eggs and gluten that his ex told him she was allergic to and they are plotting to do this during her birthday and explicitly NOT tell my friend the mom of his baby. The reasoning was “I’m the father, I deserve to be respected, I can make choices to” but he is extremely sneaky. I show my friend/baby’s mom the messages and all hell breaks loose because of course he lies and gets caught. I would have told him off directly but he blocked me because he was mad at how close I was getting to his ex. I am called a “despicable woman” dragged in their chat, made to seem that I’m spying on my husband and accused of being jealous and sabotaging my niece’s birthday party. My husband says nothing in my defense just goes along like he didn’t send me the photos of their chat…
They don’t know I’m pregnant at this time and I chose not to tell any of my in-laws due to how awful they are. I also don’t believe in telling anyone that would wish ill on me and my baby (bad juju), but my bestie the baby mom knows. I give birth his mom has an absolute tantrum says incredibly awful things to my husband, reaches out to my mom to wish her congratulations on her grandchild and says “i guess I will learn to love him.”
Then my friend the mom gets diagnosed with cancer and wants to keep this secret and makes me promise, she kept my secret pregnancy it is the least I could do. She dies a few months later and my brother in law attacks her for not telling him and claims she is a horrible mother. He takes custody of his daughter.
Fast forward the eldest brother meets this hog woman. She is rotund and English, very ignorant and rude. The first interaction I had she thought she knew so much, decides to bash my dead friend’s parenting, call my dead father in law “weird”, tells me my niece eats everything now due to having a “good parent” and called my apt in NYC “embarrassing” bc it had scaffolding on google maps when she looked me up (like a creep). She then antagonizes me in a variety of slick ways including posting the eldest brother with my niece with the caption “uncle B’s favorite!” On my son’s birthday. Most recently I tell his family that we want to actually have a proper wedding and celebrate after 10 years of marriage, i give them 2 years notice. The hog says “ohhh me and the eldest are planning on getting married then.” I ask why she says “nice weather”. She then proceeds to have a fall wedding (orange, red, greens, pumpkins, barley, wheelbarrows etc.” in May. I try to be the bigger person and send a kind welcome and she leaves me on read.
I hate these people, I need to let this go. My husband says that we should just go on continuing our happy life and not “start problems”. But it feels like so much awfulness to have to swallow. I also feel like if/when I do speak up I’m the hysterical angry black woman and this hog is the “innocent”. The whole thing is so so frustrating but I need to let it go even though I want them to hurt emotionally as much as they have hurt us.
Any recommendations, would you want revenge? There is so much more but I have written a novel already. I feel alone like no one has my back or tries to understand my perspective. They are so sneaky and underhanded. I want to protect my family from these sick people. At the same time I want justice, justice for my husband, for my dead bestie, for me son and for me.

This may upset some people. In fact I can count on it.
I only wrote this for 1% of you. For the rest, please disregard it.
A Different Game:
I'm not sure if I can explain this. I don't think that I totally understand it myself, but that's ok.
Long term fasting isn't about food, but you already knew that or you wouldn't be attempting a long fast.
This may not pertain to everyone that does a long fast. Maybe it won't pertain to any of them.
You may not know who I am, or of my situation. That's ok. I'm just some guy in a sub-reddit.
For me the battle is more important than the weightloss. Fasting can tear you down right to the core. It can lay you open and expose vulnerabilities that you didn't know you had.
That can be a good thing if you are ready for it. When you've faced something that stripes you down, you only have two ways to go. You either stay broken or you rebuild a new you.
Fasting isn't a team sport. The rebuilding process is a solo journey. You will face family and friends that mean well. You will face people on reddit that have watched a few videos of someone that thinks they know about fasting.
The fact is that after your first long fast, you have experience, they have hearsay.
Repeating what somebody else said about something that very few people have experienced is easy. There are way to many armchair quarterbacks.
For all intents and purposes they are standing on the sidewalk watching the parade go by.
We need to respect those people. They believe what they are saying. They don't mean to drag you down. They just don't understand that the game we are playing is nothing like the game they are playing.
Respecting them doesn't mean letting their opinions effect you. We leave their words to them. We step outside of their world.
We are outside of the box thinkers. We learn by doing, not by reading, watching, or listening.
In short, we cut our own path.
Long term fasting will cause you to question everything about your past, present, and future.
It will make you question yourself to the point that you lose the belief in your fight.
Don't be mistaken. This is war. You will fight battles every day of your fast.
TV commercials, concerned family members, concerned friends, people in the fasting reddit, all of these and more, are all battles. Each battle takes your energy to fight them.
We all have a limit as to how much unintentional abuse that we can take.
Remember, we are playing a different game. We aren't better than them, it's just a different game.
To succeed we close off there words. We smile and nod without telling them they are wrong. Their rules don't apply. Remember, ours is a different game. We need our energy for other challenges, tougher challenges.
Once we're in a long fast our mind will scream at us. It doesn't Remember why it stored the fat. How could it. We don't live in a world where using fat for energy is part of the equation.
We know the truth. Fat is fuel. Combine that fat with electrolytes and vitamins and your body has a built in smorgasbord.
You will face many days where you question whether it is worth it. Days when the scales aren't moving, and you are constantly thinking about your comfort food, can push you close to your limit. If you aren't confident and forward thinking it can break you.
We play a game that is much like chess. Our move is the result of a strategy that we decided on several moves ago. We don't make in the moment decisions. We know the obstacles but we don't care because we set this strategy in motion days before. Today is temporary. It is here and gone in the blink of an eye.
Tomorrow. That's how we win today's battle. Our mind is already in tomorrow. How can we giving in today if we are already in a tomorrow frame of mind.
Our battle is intense. As with chess, sometimes we have to sacrifice a pawn, maybe even a knight. We do this by skipping a family gathering or a superbowl party if they fall within our fasting plan.
I've missed Easter, Thanksgiving, my birthday, my mom's birthday, mother's day, and 4th of july cookouts.
This game requires sacrifice. The weightloss is great. I've lost 240 pounds, but that is irrelevant.
Our true opponent is our mind. Nothing else can matter. In truth, nothing else exists. We stand alone. Alone against family, friends, and armchair experts.
On one fast, I was on day 56. My mind was done. I didn't think I had anything left in the gas tank, but I've faced things in life that totally wiped me out. I knew there is always just a little more left if we reach deep.
I held on. My mind was screaming. I couldn't hear anything but, "give in, it's over"
I dug deep. I went to my room. I just wanted to go to bed. I climbed on my bed. I couldn't climb under the covers. That would take too much external energy. I knelt on my bed. I rocked back and forth for three hours. I was sobbing uncontrollably. My body was shaking from the depth of those sobbs.
I made it. The tears ended. The rocking ended. I collapsed on my bed and slept for hours.
I faced one of the hardest challenges in my 55 years on this planet.
That victory is mine. Nobody can take it from me. Believe it or not several people from this fasting community tried. They told me that I was lying. They said I got lucky because I didn't die. They said I would cause someone to take their last breath.
I didn't care what they said, and I don't care now. The victory is mine. Any time I struggle I look back on that morning. I remember the intensity. I fought so hard, and I won. What challenge can I face in the future that could compare. The answer is, nothing. Nothing I will face can hold a candle to that day.
I've faced some extreme challenges. My girlfriend passed from cancer while laying in the bed beside of me. My mom went to prison when I was little. Our friend was murdered. One of our friends came over after he had been shot. We were robbed at gunpoint. None of that compared.
Even Marine Corps boot camp paled in comparison to that day.
We face intense situations while fasting. This may sound bad but I hope you can experience that. I can't think of anything that could ever take me down. I look back on that day and it empowers me. With that memory I can tackle any opponent.
We play a different game. Don't forget that.
99% of people on here won't get it. Many will condemn and down vote this.
I'll say it again, we play a different game. They won't get it and thats ok.
After you face your demons. After you make it out the other side, there is nothing left to compare.
Our battle may be different but the final outcome is the same.
We win.
After that challenge,
we win because that's all we know.

I (21F) am moderately active as I am lifting heavy boxes all day at my job. I have decent muscle but lately my waistline has increased past 32 inches and my pants are not fitting like they used to. I think I'm eating too many fats and processed foods but I have little to no energy to cook and not a whole lot of money to spend on high quality microwave foods. Are there any high protien meal plans that don't require a lot of prep/cooking to make?

In the 19, nearly 20, years I have lived my life, I was raised a Christian by American conservatives in a middle class environment and am fortunate to experience countless memories of joy, laughter, and growth with (mostly) everybody I have met. Each memory with the people in my life holds a special place in my heart, and I will forever cherish the bond we built.
The thing is that until the end of eighth grade, I had a strange obsession with East Asia. Looking back, it was very embarrassing and I condemn my parents for enabling me to become a weeaboo (by “weeaboo”, I mean “a person who is overly obsessed with East Asian culture, especially Japanese culture, to the point that they fetishize the culture in an unhealthy way”). I was the textbook example of a weeaboo who had a terrible case of “yellow fever” (sexual preference towards East Asians). Loving the image of East Asian culture without having any real idea what it stood for and seeing the East as a utopia, my fetishization of East Asia, especially Japan, was born out of the shame I have with the Western culture I was raised in. I never felt like I could fit in with my Western peers who I often looked down upon and did not want to be associated with. It got to the point that I became unsatisfied with my home town, my physical appearance, and even my closest friends. This combined with the surge in anime, K-pop, and other media on the internet really got me hooked and believing really fetish-y things about the Sinosphere. I hate being reminded of it and have tried to move on.
However, I am thankful for my exposure to Eastern culture, though it was through a very bastardized, Westernized lens. I am grateful for my exposure, even though it started out with something as intellectually undemanding as Vocaloid music (songs sung by a Japanese voice synthesizer). The best part about the exposure was that it helped me leave Christianity and join Buddhism at age 11, which greatly helped with my mental health considering I was experiencing suicidal thoughts since the age of 8. Though I had awful misunderstandings of Buddhism in the beginning and still do not really have a Buddhist teacher, I am glad that I have the resources to connect myself with other Buddhists and take refuge in the Triple Gem.
As I left my gross misconceptions of the Sinosphere behind back when I was 14 while still having a healthy interest in it, my eyes were eventually opened to perils which threaten not only the homelands of Buddhism (East, South, and Southeast Asia), but also the sustainability of modern humans. These two perils are Western culture and capitalist fascism.
The West exoticizes and misrepresents Buddhism and the culture of its home, the East, as a whole. I am ashamed to be born in a culture where this was encouraged, which I am worried could lead me to fetishizing Eastern culture again.
But what I know for sure is that the West’s hyperindividualism is harming people, both those whose lands are invaded and its own people. This combined with the West’s growing rejection of education, including that of the knowledge the West itself has given to the world for humanity’s benefit, makes it clear that it is lacking some of the Sinosphere’s cultural strengths. Everybody should hold collectivism and education to the same degree that the Sinosphere does, otherwise we would be left with an unsustainable society that would destroy itself.
There is nothing wrong with speaking Western languages, eating Western foods, watching (most types of) Western media, wearing Western clothes, and especially nothing wrong with using Western inventions, but we are now seeing that the West’s hyperindividualism and rejection of education is destructive and spreading like a cancer.
It is only Buddhists who make an effort to assimilate to the East (had they not been born into it) who can see the West with its hyperindividualism and uneducatedness, promoted by its creation of its spreading ideologies such as capitalist fascism and social Darwinism, for what it really is: a cancer. I can now see the direction the United States, the most populated and powerful country in the West, is going due to the rise of ultra-capitalism and/or fascism supporters.
Rarely the phrase “Western”, as in “formed by the combined foundations of Greco-Roman civilization and Western Christianity” (Gabbe), raised positive thoughts in my mind since I learned about it shortly after discovering Buddhism. “Western” when used in the context of medicine is an exception to this, but we are now seeing more and more Westerners dishonor the progress their ancestors made towards modern, mainstream, dare I say, Western medicine as they fall for anti-vaccine and anti-mask pseudoscience.
Nowadays, some who use the word in a derogatory context are uneducated reactionaries that bash anything and everything Western, yet hypocritically promote the Western political ideology of fascism. A strength that a majority (though now a decreasing number) of Western countries have is their progressivism, supporting scientific advancements, women’s rights, racial equality, and the LGBT+. However, this is not just becoming less common; being a progressive Westerner is not enough, not enough to end Western imperialism, to save the sacred truths taught to us by the Shakyamuni Buddha, or to empower the working class.
Although I never fully approved of Western culture after my weeaboo phase ended, my early teen self still ended up falling into the anti-social justice warrior side of YouTube that I now recognized hindered my understanding of what actually ruined my country, the United States of America. I still did not feel comfortable calling myself a Westerner but mainly because the West did not widely accept Buddhism and has several times in its history persecuted Buddhists. At the same time, I was deceived by a bastardized form of Buddhism common among Westerners (known as “secular Buddhism”, which picks and chooses aspects of the Buddha’s teachings instead of accepting them as a whole), so I was a bit more of the classic, stereotypical atheist neckbeard who fetishized the East up until 2020. Since then, my views became more progressive similar to those of American liberals and I denounced traditionalist Western beliefs, but like the average American liberal, I did not see Western culture, both traditional and progressive, as the peril I now see it. It was not until around the end of 2023 when I discovered the Western problem.
It was a slow burn that started with my discovery of Buddhists on the internet talking about how the West misrepresented Buddhism to appeal to “self-help” consumerists, Christians, and New Age followers. In the Westerner, I originally saw only a person who followed harmless customs, traditions, and other norms that came from a part of the world where Buddhism was not the dominant religion (if you could even call the non-theistic dharma as taught by the Gautama Buddha a religion). And so, I did not believe that Western civilization needed to fall for the safety of the dharma, let alone for its own people. After all, I thought to myself, the West has contributed so much to science and the modern world as we know it. I still believe to this day that there are no superior cultures and that each one simply has its own unique strengths and weaknesses, some of which are only subjective. However, while looking through Buddhist forums, I was shocked to hear about the West’s pollution of Buddhism and my knowledge on Buddhism skyrocketed as I learned that I fell victim to the Dunning-Kruger effect. I started reading sutras and immersing myself with Buddhism by listening to those who have much more experience than I do. There are hardly any Buddhists in my community and the only Buddhist center within reach is a New Kadampa Tradition meditation center (FYI: the New Kadampa Tradition must be avoided since it has a reputation for financially exploiting members and its monastics have allegations of drug trafficking and sexual abuse), so books and the internet are all I have left.
Practicing Buddhism in the West is nearly impossible without a community, without a Buddhist teacher, without any resources written by Eastern Buddhists. Reddit user u/Tendai-Student, a “lay Tendai Student [sic] with aspirations to become a Priest [sic]” states the following:
It is exceedingly challenging for a Westerner who is interested in Buddhism to find reliable information. Bookstores' Buddhist sections are rife with myths about the religion (we will come to some of these misconceptions below). Buddhism-related disinformation abounds in university classes. Misinformation about Buddhism abounds in publications with a Buddhist theme. Even Buddhism-related english-speaking [sic] Reddit boards are prone to carry false information.
Buddhism is constantly distorted in the same way: to make it more agreeable to Abrahamic faiths(especially Christianity in the west) [sic]. To imply that it is subject to Western standards, Western religion, and Western consumerism and materialism.
…Asian teachers are frequently excluded from English-speaking Buddhist places (meditation centers, university forums, periodicals). Asians make up the majority of Buddhists in the United States, despite the fact that popular images of Buddhism in the West make it appear otherwise. In the minds of Westerners, Buddhism is a religion of white converts. They don't even pay attention to the odd lack of Asians in some Buddhist areas. (u/Tendai-Student)
It is no wonder that I went through a phase when I was a weeaboo with “yellow fever”. The Westerner commodifies and commercializes these Buddhist practices and East Asian customs like they do with several other cultures. Its misuse and stealing of Buddhism is the worst because its teachings are for us to end suffering by ridding ourselves of the three poisons: greed, ignorance, and hatred (which the Westerner promotes).
My realization of this drew me away from the West, similar to when my obsession with the East began. The difference is that my interest in the East now is not because of a fantasy born out of misguidance, especially not a sexual one. I now know that there is more to the East than its pop culture. But I cannot help thinking that none of this would have happened and I would better understand Buddhism had I been born to and raised by Buddhists in East Asia, or even a majority Buddhist country in South or Southeast Asia.
However, the possibility of a cycle starting with a yo-yoing fetishization of the East makes me anxious. When I realized what I was doing at first was fetishization, I did further research and found out that the West is to blame for its portrayal of the East in its media. This in turn makes me denounce the West and brings me back towards my obsession with the Sinosphere, which could lead to more fetishization.
Despite this, I am glad that at the very least, my interest is more than just wanting to live a kawaii lifestyle, hoping to have a “submissive housewife who will look young forever”, or all that neckbeard squick. I do have to say that there is something else that is drawing me towards the Sinosphere, not to mention that it is the region where Buddhism is dominant (the same is true to a lesser extent with the Indosphere). Even though I am not a huge fan of tradition since I am very progressive, when a region’s culture gets something right, they get it right. In addition to Buddhist values, the Sinosphere holds education and collectivism to a high degree. It is no wonder I find their people so much more intelligent and caring than people from my culture.
It is common knowledge that countries such as Japan, China, South Korea, and Singapore have the highest average IQs. To add to this (unbeknownst to many), even less developed countries, e.g. Mongolia, with high Buddhist populations around the same region, have average IQs higher than developing and undeveloped nations outside the region. The most agreed upon reason for this is cultural factors rather than genetic or economic factors. To conclude, Buddhism combined with values in the East Asian cultural sphere creates the best “brains” to represent humanity, thus the West should make way for them, especially considering the East’s superior collectivism.
Of course cultures do not stay the same forever because they change over time. One big thing that is different now in the Sinosphere and Indosphere (the latter I am mentioning because it is where Buddhism came from, though it is not as dominant in the cultural region as it was) is that they are generally much more patriarchal and anti-LGBT+ than they were up until the last several centuries. However, Buddhism treats same-sex relations and being transgender the same as heterosexuality and being cisgender (preferring celibacy among monastics, though depending on the school of Buddhism, those in the monastic order may be treated as their birth gender, even if they are transgender), and in addition, the Buddha taught that women are just as capable of attaining enlightenment as men. Even outside of Buddhism, there are records of same-sex relations as early as the Shang dynasty in China and the temple walls in Khajuraho, India depict homosexual activity. As for feminism, China was matrilineal until the Han dynasty era, when Confucianism and filial piety became mainstream in the area, while India, home to over 100 different ethnic communities, has had a few matriarchal and egalitarian societies pre-European colonization. In the modern era, numerous people in the two cultural spheres are becoming more supportive of gender equality and the LGBT+, which in some cases may be due to Westernization (not that it redeems it) or simply the individuals’ progressive political views not influenced by Western culture.
What has stayed the same for the most part, besides Buddhism, is the Sinosphere’s and Indosphere’s value of collectivism in honor-shame societies and the former cultural sphere’s emphasis on education; this is what Westerners, as well as people all over the world, need for themselves. If the West is going to fall due to hyperconsumerism, late stage capitalism, and uneducated leaders, those living in the West would be better off joining Buddhism and assimilating to the East. Arguably, the best way to do this is to move to a majority Buddhist country, preferably one in the Sinosphere (its core countries being China, Japan, the Koreas, Taiwan, and Vietnam). Leave everybody you know from your home behind, especially non-Buddhists. Just to make things clear, Westerners are not necessarily evil and it is not their fault they were raised in a Western culture, but having these people in your life will hold you back from collectivism, quality education free of anti-intellectual quackery, and above all, understanding the dharma.
After you have left everybody in your life and started anew, you can immerse yourself in the culture. Again, abandoning Western food, media, clothing, and especially inventions and scientific breakthroughs is very unnecessary. Your main focus is reprogramming your mind to think like a person (specifically a Buddhist person) in the Sinosphere/Indosphere, utilizing the high educational standards, putting the collective over the individual, and taking refuge in the Triple Gem. Before moving, though, it is best to make yourself familiar with the customs and learn the language of the place you are moving to. To aid your assimilation, it would not hurt to start dating one of the locals who strongly identifies with the culture, regardless of their race. Someone living there who is not ethnically East, South, or Southeast Asian who is still very involved in the culture would be very helpful to your assimilation as one who is ethnically East, South, or Southeast Asian (I am clarifying this to discourage racial fetishization). This may be difficult as you would have to win over approval from their parents, let alone convince them to see you as another Easterner, but if you manage to do so, that would be fantastic. To make things easier, you could plan to move to a country where people treat women as equals and are relatively accepting of the LGBT+ so you would not have to worry about gender roles or whatever. Think of places in the Sinosphere such as Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong, or if you are planning on going to the Indosphere (which is not too big of a step down) since they did give us Buddhism after all, Nepal and Thailand. Your most important goal, however, is to rewire your brain to think in a more Sinic or Indic way and be more in touch with Buddhism.
You can hardly consider yourself a Westerner if you manage to do so, being Western only in your country of origin (and possibly race as well). I am definitely not like those other “people” from the West who strongly cling to Western culture because they just do not understand. Western cultural merit is almost solely from the proxy of our ancestors’ inventions, scientific discoveries, and political revolutions. Considering that the West is being brought towards the wrong direction in the modern era, we should get out of there culturally, if not physically, until it all hits the fan.
If the West continues its defilement of the rest of the world, when it falls, it will bring it all down with it. We must not lose or else everybody loses.
This pressure has a good side; because the bigger the great threat becomes, the more we will push ourselves to assimilate and raise children to fight for us. Considering the infectability of Western anti-intellectualism and “main character syndrome”, how could our Western peers know better? Buddhism is not a proselytizing “religion”, so our best bet is eliminating the promoter of the three poisons, the Westerner (especially the Christian Westerner), from our own lives. How it will run to us as its society collapses under itself and we welcome it to assimilate but say “we told you so”! The older I get, the better I know the Westerner. The better I know the Westerner, the easier it gets to excuse hostility against them, especially from the Sinosphere.
From my perspective, the ones to blame are not the angry, low-middle class white males in the rural United States nor the boba conservative bananas and right-wing coconuts who suck up to the West’s biggest scum, but rather the ones who have brainwashed them to fall for chauvinism, reactionarism, and laissez faire capitalism.
Realizing this, I am now closely investigating the sources of these beliefs which make up the foundation of social Darwinism and, when combined with totalitarian thinking, capitalist fascism. This is after I noticed that these systems are unsustainable and would destroy themselves from the inside out. The slow, painful destruction of communities who fall victim to them are well known to me. If one looks carefully, they can see the consequences that have been unfolding since the 2020 Coronavirus Pandemic. You may wonder: were the founders aware of this? My guess would be that they were not but were evil nonetheless because they were too selfish to think about the future, their descendants.
If this is the case, then it is the duty of us, the opponents of these ideologies, to spread the word faster than the ideologies are currently spreading in the West. It is hard for me to believe it is not the case considering that both Western political ideologies are fundamentally reactionary. Besides, I doubt they would want civilization as we know it to collapse.
I have a social Darwinist as a maternal uncle who sometimes meets with my parents, maternal grandfather, and younger brother and with his political conversations, often sourced from flawed studies, Russian news, and 4chan, I can easily study the principles of its theories. Both of my parents are also conservatives who support Trump and other immoral American politicians. Being raised by the two of them, I bet I could disguise myself as a Western right-wing traditionalist, maybe even a social Darwinist, since I know the way they speak, to whom they flock to, and how to make them give one their full attention. It would probably be easy to do this as some right-wing grifters can fool American right-wing audiences into thinking that they share the same beliefs (e.g. Thomas MacDonald).
Their kind are gullible because they do not listen to fact checkers and often do not do research to see if who they are listening to really practices what they preach.
Even though there are Westerners who are not like this, the West cannot coexist with Buddhism, let alone the cultures where it is dominant, as the West ruled by colonizing tirthikas and it will likely always be for as long as it lasts. And just because their culture is not as viable as the one founded on Buddhist, Sinic, or even Indic values does not give them the right to imperialize the rest of the world and bring it down with them. We can welcome the Westerner willing to change its ways, turn it into one of an Easterner, and have its culture go through a quick and painless demise, or the Westerner can continue its power trip, destroy everything it touches along with itself, and society will suffer a slow and painful death. This is what the conclusion that I have come to so far as I examine capitalist fascism and Westerners’ connection to it.
The Western doctrine of capitalist fascism rejects an aspect of maitrī, fulfilling beings’ basic needs, and substitutes it for a privilege towards the bourgeoisie and the exploitation of the workers’ labor (also known as Vergegenständlichung or “objectification”). Thus it denies the worth of the collective, only concerns itself with greedy individuals, and thus is immoral. Unlike what the non-Buddhist capitalist wants people to believe, all beings have an altruistic Buddha nature, but it is corrupted, being difficult to notice as it has only conditions without a beginning (listed in the Avijjā Sutta). Abandoning capitalism, both fascist and non-fascist, gives power to the people as it ensures a more guaranteed right to life instead of having not even one thousand billionaires own more than half of Earth’s population combined, more than each one of those billionaires could ever spend in their lifetimes.
Should the Westerner, especially one who pushes capitalist fascism, strengthen its grip on humanity, it can be said that it would make its own naraka.
And so I stand by my plan and encourage others to do the same because it is in the name of the Unsurpassable Enlightened One. By protecting our kind against the Westerner, we are defending the Triple Gem.
If it is not already clear, the disapproval I feel towards the societal values and prevailing norms of the West has led me to question my place in this environment. I believe that meaningful change can only be fostered if the West is put into its place and the Sino-Buddhist East motivates our minds.
In Vietnam, where the culture is predominantly Sinic with some Indic aspects and little European influence, we can see the promotion of quality education, collectivism, and Buddhism (practiced by a forgivable 15% of the population), very unlike the nearby country of the Philippines. In the Philippines, its citizens cling to the Anglo-Saxon and Hispanic culture brought to the country by American and Spaniard imperialists. The effects of this are very clear in their average IQs (Vietnam: 89.53 vs. Philippines: 81.64) and PISA scores (Vietnam: 1403 vs. Philippines: 1058). They are both developing countries in Southeast Asia that were colonized by the West, but because Vietnam kept its culture more pure and stuck to Buddhism (or at least Sinic philosophies), its people are better educated compared to the nearby Westernized countries in a similar economic situation.
In short, Westernization leads to the following:

1. The native culture becomes diluted
2. If Western thinking intrudes, mental degeneration takes hold of the native population and its society slowly degrades along with the West itself as it eats itself from the inside out

Those who cause this to happen must be stopped, especially those who endanger Buddhism. We must not wait for the fruition of their karma for their sacrilege of the Tathagata’s teachings because by then it would be too late, and even if it is instant karma, every bodhisattva’s job is to end suffering.
Those who spread the harmful ideologies bring themselves and others away from the Buddha’s word are polluting humanity by having them join their rat race that will only end in their own demise. They are leading to the ruin of many and thus, I do not consider them to be human but instead parasites.
There is a disgraceful Western belief that for a short amount of time was not held by the majority but is now very pervasive in the West and also is the foundation of reactionarism, chauvinism, and capitalism in all cultures. It says: “My individual rights matter the most and freedom means my right to violate the rights of others.”
This Western babble is followed by numerous all around the world and sows disharmony in societies where it becomes the norm. This idea provides basis for several types of Westerners, including but not limited to:

• the “Karen”; a middle-aged, entitled, often white and anti-mask/anti-vaccine female who makes trivial complaints
• the “Chud”; a racist, misogynistic, right-wing male (usually young) who browses 4chan everyday and has a high likelihood of becoming a mass shooter
• the dayangma (Hanzi: 大洋马); a sex-obsessed young adult Western female, majority white but sometimes POC, is conventionally attractive (to Westerners), sleeps around, and in some cases creates spawn that do not know their father(s)
• the angry white male; self-explanatory, right-wing and traditionalist (sometimes a social Darwnist or capitalist fascist), commonly rural, evangelical Christian and have never seen a POC before
• the “Trad Wife”; a prudish, sometimes uneducated, female who lets Western males walk all over it and raises spawn who are likely to become angry whites
• the New Agehippy; generally a teenager or young adult, a well-meaning but poorly educated white liberal or social democrat who misappropriates Buddhism and appeases Muslims
• the AmeriKKKan fathegrandfather; a middle-aged to elderly, chauvinist male with children, sometimes also grandchildren, and is unconcerned about social justice and similarly to the “Karen”, falls for pseudoscientific conspiracy theories
• the neckbearded otaku (Hiragana: おたく); a hairy white male with “yellow fever” and mediocre hygiene, for the most part subreddit/Discord server moderators who stalk and kidnap East Asian ladies (if not teenage girls)

The growth of these groups is evidence of the degradation of Western culture, showing that it must retire as the dominant culture and make way for the much more sustainable East. Once the manuṣya realm on Earth is completely tainted by the West, Buddhas can no longer arise in the world because the dharma would be known by nobody and the Vinaya are forgotten or destroyed.
The future generation will not remember the dharma unless we halt the growth of the parasitic culture that promotes overconsumption, hyperindividualism, and anti-intellectualism.
The Westerner has a remarkable contrast to the Sinic or Indic. The Westerner has a grasp on this world so strong with its weaponry since the 16th century, using force to disrupt the traditional lives of whatever native people it saw, safe for those in a few countries (even though some of those countries are still being Westernized). The Dutch, English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish built colonies from the Americas to Southeast Asia. The kingdoms were blessed with powerful militaries, strong economies, stable governments, and advanced technology that allowed their cultures to spread. But after half a millennium and looking back, was any of this really earned? And is the Westerner’s conquest over yet?
Since the Great Schism of Christianity, the Westerner trained itself for roughly one thousand years. It trained itself in several aspects, but it forgot an important piece, the dharma. The cunning Westerner, blessed with advancements, used them to tyrannize other peoples on a scale never before seen. This was the beginning of the Latter Day of the Dharma. The dharma is declining because of the savage Westerner. And so, it leeched off of any people it got a hold of, including predominantly Buddhist peoples. Even during the decolonization of the 20th century, fundamentalist Christianity spread and threatened the dharma. To make matters worse, previously Buddhist peoples clung to Christianity as taught by their colonizers; the French in Vietnam and the Spanish and Americans in the Philippines. To this day, the Philippines is a lost cause along with its majority Muslim neighbors in Maritime Southeast Asia. The cunning Westerner turned the Filipino against us and now Buddhists make up only 2% of the Philippines’ population. Now, the Westerner sees Buddhism as nothing more than an aesthetic, a self-help lifestyle, or a decoration that they can commercialize and cherry pick aspects to integrate into their religion or lack thereof.
It is excellent for someone from the West to learn the dharma as this will turn them into a more compassionate and wise person, but they must not enforce the Western gaze onto it and discard parts of the Shakyamuni Buddha’s words they do not like. To be fair, some aspects of Buddhism would be nearly impossible for a Westerner to understand unless they assimilate.
Buddhism is not materialist or blind belief without evidence and it belongs to the East, so stop pretending to be something you are not while pushing stereotypes of Asian Buddhists.
However, even though Buddhism is not materialist or very in line with the Western worldview, it is uniquely human. Walpola Rahula, a Sri Lankan Buddhist monk and writer explains it this way:
Among the founders of religions the Buddha (if we are permitted to call him the founder of a religion in the popular sense of the term) was the only teacher who did not claim to be other than a human being, pure and simple. Other teachers were either God, or his incarnations in different forms, or inspired by him. The Buddha was not only a human being; he claimed no inspiration from any god or external power either. He attributed all his realization, attainments and achievements to human endeavour and human intelligence. A man and only a man can become Buddha. Every man has within himself the potentiality of becoming a Buddha, if he so wills it and endeavours. We can call the Buddha a man par excellence. He was so perfect in his 'human-ness' that he came to be regarded later in popular religion almost as 'super-human'. Man's position, according to Buddhism, is supreme. Man is his own master, and there is no higher being or power that sits in judgment over his destiny. (Rahula 3)
How could one even consider the Westerners who diluted Buddhism human themselves at this point? If it were not for them, Westerners may have a better understanding of the teachings of the “man par excellence”. We are lucky that the only Westerners who necessarily see us as inferior are white nationalists and fundamentalist Christians, otherwise the Westerner could have committed a genocide that would have left millions of us dead. Westerners are competitive beings, so they rarely act in concord towards each other. It is only when there is something that draws them together or away from a common danger.
If everybody on Earth becomes a Westerner, they would wallow in their shamelessness and would have nobody left to exploit except for each other until they destroy themselves.
Until they are the only ones left, they will vilify and exploit anything non-Western until they only have each other, then leading to a chaotic world of undignified militaries, economic inequality, corrupt governments, and little or no innovations.
Unless the Westerner considers even the slightest of inspiration from the East, it will continue to follow hyperindividualism and have apathy towards its education. That is why the West is falling. Those from the West who are smart enough to realize that the West’s flaws that it spreads are deciding that the West is not worth maintaining and its resignation is overdue. If those from the West abandon it to assimilate to the East, it would make the West’s death quicker but more dignified.
This is more than a fad but rather the realization that Western society would be best being a passing fad itself. The West gave us great inventions, food, clothes, scientific discoveries, etc. and once it is gone, the East can pick up where it left off just fine.
We will never abandon the Triple Gem because we recognize it to be more than a spiritual, exotic aesthetic or trend. To do so would make us just like those others in the West who Asian Buddhists look down upon. When the time is right, each and every one of us will surround ourselves with the people who know the dharma better than anyone you have met in the West and we can finally be at their level. We shall be Western only in our country of origin and/or race, but in every other way, we will be Easterners; Buddhist Easterners who will take back what rightfully belongs to us.
When we (and hopefully Buddhists outside of both the Eastern and the Western world) do this, consumerism will lose some of its biggest prey. Even though it may not seem like it at first considering we are abandoning everyone we have ever known, we are doing our ancestors a favor by joining the culture that strives towards the end of suffering. We will be leaving our cultures’ ways of thinking behind, but doing this will save face for our lineage, especially the Western lineage as we would be preventing the creation of more “Karens”, “Chuds”, dayangmas, “neckbeards”, and other degenerates. We will not be annoying dorky nerds and certainly not “neckbeards” who are overly obsessed with and fetishize the culture but people making an effort to get closer to the dharma and surrender to the East.
Although we are collectivists, we must seek personal liberation first for the good of other beings. Once the West collapses and its former supporters come running to us, we shall welcome them. If some do not recognize this before it is too late, well boo hoo! They will have a better birth with the world we will create. Some of them, especially their unlucky spawn, would probably be better off dead and reborn into a better life, maybe even the Pure Land.
The way it is looking now, the West is falling and becoming the world’s laughingstock, which is a good thing. The quicker it falls, the less painful it will be for the Westerner and everybody else. Western culture will not be missed, but we can keep the best of it and continue the innovations that the creators would wish to see. We will remember the legacy of them and be thankful while never forgiving or forgetting the ones who ruined the West.
Works Cited
“Ignorance Avijjā Sutta (AN 10:61).” Translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu. Dhammatalks. 2017, https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN10_61.html. Accessed 31 May 2024.
Gabbe. “Western Culture.” Wikipedia. 25 May 2024. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_culture#:~:text=The%20core%20of%20Western%20civilization,Roman%20civilization%20and%20Western%20Christianity. Accessed 31 May 2024.
Rahula Thero, Walpola. What the Buddha Taught. Oneworld Publications, 1959. Accessed 31 May 2024.
u/Tendai-Student. “栄真Eishin (u/Tendai-Student).” Reddit, 31 May 2024, https://www.reddit.com/useTendai-Student/. Accessed 31 May 2024.
u/Tendai-Student. “Buddhism is being MISREPRESENTED in the West Marginalisation, cultural appropriation, misconceptions and what you can do.” Reddit, 2023, https://www.reddit.com/WrongBuddhism/comments/14zc6xg/buddhism_is_being_misrepresented_in_the_west/. Accessed 31 May 2024.

Introduction
A 27 year old man who absolutely values independence, equality, principles of feminism while still believing in good-old chivalrous habits like holding the door for the lady, walking by the curb, and dropping the woman home, not because she's incapable of it, but because that's the nice thing to do and shows that you've been raised with manners and decency?! Whatever happened to doing things out of kindness of your own heart without having a hidden agenda behind it? Anyhow, this man is looking for a long-term relationship aimed at finally settling down, and perhaps even starting a family if the woman is willing.
About me
Absolutely average looking guy. 5'11" in height, keeps a stubble and neatly trimmed beard, dark hair, brown eyes which turn golden in sunlight (in my girly era YAY!), features a dad-bod, healthy, working on maintaining my shape because have put on a bit weight lately, clean, hygienic, and no disease whatsoever.
I hail primarily from Northern India, but I have lived practically in every zone of the Indian Subcontinent.
Professional Life
I have worked as an Assistant Professor earlier in my life, and I'm currently pursuing a degree in Business from one of the most prestigious institutes in the country. I hold decent amount of certifications to enable me to work and earn myself and my family a decent living in India or any other place. I plan on finishing this degree and entering into a corporate job hopefully with a work-life balance so I can dedicate enough time to family.
Hobbies/Interests
I am someone who absolutely loves to read, and have an aim of building my/our own library in the place where we live in. Not big into self-help books, mostly do philosophy, fiction, classics, etc. Apart from reading, I love to cook and bake, and this is something I taught myself BEFORE COVID, not during the "khali hai toh lets cook" phase. I like going on drives (car and bike) at dusk, and would be lucky to get some company alongwith. While I wouldn't say I'm a very outgoing person, I enjoy music festivals, carnivals, and I've been told that I'm an excellent company to go shopping with (YES, that includes shopping at Sarojini). Where would I personally like to go if I'm new to a city? Heritage sites, Museums, and places with GOOD FOOD.
About Yourself?
A woman (no homophobia, just that I am clear with my sexuality) ideally within the age bracket ±8 years, I've mostly dated women older than me so not that big of a deal. Someone who is willing to keep up with all the dad-jokes and absolutely inhumane puns. Whether or not you choose to work is absolutely your choice. Clingy-ness is cute and adored. Open with her communication, honest with their partner, and loyalty. Race/Caste/Religion/Skin Colour absolutely do not matter.
What am I looking for?
Getting to know the person, letting that person grow on me and vice-versa, eventually forming a bond which would lead to a relationship. I consider myself pretty open-minded about things, and I communicate openly about things which I'm okay and not okay about.
Open to verification. Photos get photos. Message or Reddit Chat either works. I personally don't like either, but hey, your comfort takes precedence. Looking forward to hearing from you. Cheers!

Chapter 1: Hope’s 16th Birthday
As the rays of the sun hits her eyes Hope Moonshine wakes up excited, she was waiting for this day for all her life
She jumps out of her bed and rushes to her mom's room excited and she accidentally flung the door open too fast making a loud cranking noise waking her mother, Queen Matilda up
"Oops didn't mean to wake you up" hope said awkwardly"Honey I know you are excited for your birthday but you need to be patient the sun has just risen everyone is still asleep" Matilda said tiredly, "please go back to sleep darling you will have a long day today and you will need the energy, your party wont be begin till noon"
"Ok mom, sorry for waking you up" said Hope as she was trying to close the door slowly enough that it doesn't crank but it still did "Not an issue dear", said Matilda
As the door closed Matilda took a deep breath and closed her eyes her emblem on her right shoulder a pink diamond glowed she opened her eyes and she made a finger gun with her right hand pointing at the hinges and a shiny pink light zaps comes out of her index and zaps the hinges, the beam turns into a hand and it open the door and then closes without making a cranking noise, "I should have done that a long time ago" said Matilda
She removes the blankets from her bed to reveal she is already clothed for a serious occasion, as she goes towards the mirror she is wearing a long cyan dress that trails all the way to her feed her top being smartly tight with short shoulder sleeves, she puts on long white gloves and glances over her diamond ring she lets out a small sigh and frown and puts it on, she trances over the mirror for a few seconds before snapping out of it, and she looks over to a miniature painting of her an her daughter when she was 6 she picks it up and smiles "I know you are eager dear you won't have to wait for long"
After Matilda ready's herself she open her window and conjures a light bird of the palm of her hand, the bird flew off to Hope's room where it sees her lying in her bed on her stomach, the bird soon returns to Matilda's room and land on her palm her eyes glows for a moment and the bird fizzes into a yellow cloud, "Well it looks like she actually listened not very common of her to do so, it means I can continue to do my plan unobstructed" she said with a smile.
Matilda leaves her room and walk across the hallway to the main hall then she claps her hand twice, and snap her finger, suddenly a figure jumps into the window it spins 180° and a muscular women stands up, she has a scar on her left cheek and short brown hair, she wore knight armour that cuts of at her shoulder emblem that looks like a dark grey shield.
"At your service my queen", she said with a salute
Matilda is startled for a moment, but then composes herself, "Sally there is no need for you to enter that way you can just wait for me at the hall entrance", she said.
"I was scouting the perimeter we have to make sure this place is safe and to make sure no one can harm the princess at her important day, I was up all night with my team searching every corner of the upper ring for any danger and-" Sally was abruptly cut off by Matilda.
"It was not your fault Sally, there is no need for you to prove yourself to me" Matilda said remorsefully, "You tried your best so you must eventually forgive yourself it wasn't anyone fault, it truly came from nowhere"
Sally's serious expression break into expression of regret as she shamefully looks at the ground
"Now is not time to punish ourselves over who we failed to protect but to make sure my daughter has a great birthday" Matilda said with determination
Sally's expressions of regret turned to a smile, "Yes my Queen, me and the royal guards have spent last few weeks clearing a safe path from the upper ring to the more presentable areas of the lower ring that ends at the great barrier" Sally says with a salute.
"Well I trust your judgement, you are now dismissed" said Matilda
Sally goes down the stairs of the central hall towards the doors "I won't mess up again" Sally said with determination
"Oh Houston" Matilda said while turning her head left and right, "where is he when I need him",
"I am right here your majesty" Houston whispered from behind, Matilda was startled and was annoyed on how everyone seems to sneak up on her, "Sorry for spooking you" said Houston as he polished his monocle "We are well prepared to begin celebration soon" he said as his hand pointed towards the empty hall.
Matilda stared at him, he then clapped his hands and an army of servants entered the hall setting up the chairs and tables, followed up by waiters quickly setting food on the table, and then 6 waiters came together to slowly lift the large 4 layered birthday cake with a milk white colour with chocolate cream on top of each layer, with "happy birthday Hope" spelled with strawberry topping on the side of each layer, with the glowing yellow number "16" candle at the top.
"As I was saying my Queen" Houston started "We just need to wait for the guests to arrive, I will let you know when you can call your daughter" Houston stops from a moment "Do you want anything else your majesty or am I dismissed?" he asked.
"You are dismissed Houston" said Matilda
Matilda walks up to Hope's room and slowly opens the door to find her laying in her bed
"One thousand one hundred and forty-two" Hope counted to herself, she paused and took a deep sigh, and tried to continue but then paused scratching her head "Um One-".
she was interrupted by her mother saying "Thousand one hundred and forty-three", "Unable to sleep dear?" She said with a smile, Hope gasped and she had the biggest smile in her face, her mother was a bit startled and asked "what is it you are smiling at?".
Hope pointed at her, jumped from her bed and as she was taking heavy breathes pointing at her mother clothes, "You don't sleep in this" she takes a deep breath and exclaims "which means I have got to get ready" and she runs to her closet to pick up something to wear.
Matilda takes a glance down at her clothes and rolls her eyes "so much for a surprise"
"I am ready mom" Hope said ecstatically, she was wearing a beautiful turquoise dress which complemented her hair colour styled in two plates with with joined with a pink band and wearing her favourite golden necklace,
"That was quick" her mother commented
As they enter the main hall a bunch of guests are seated drinking beverages and helping themselves to freshly baked foods, "Attention everybody, I would like you to welcome the birthday girl" said Houston, everyone stopped what they were doing and turned their heads towards the princess.
She gets a bit nervous and let out an awkward "hey guys", she didn't recognize any of them but she had to pretend to know all of them while hoping they don't ask her if she knows them, they all continue to stare as she and her mother get seated.
Houston lets out a forced cough to break the awkward silence, he says "and now Princess that you have come here you may blow the candles", the table the cake was on was carried towards Hope and her mother seated on there high chair, Hope tries to mask her excitement as she takes a deep breath and gently blow the candles, which fire off the cake and make a small explosion spelling out "Happy Birthday Princess!", Hope's eyes lit with joy.
Trumpets play and two royal servants come into the hall holding a gold plated chest decorated with diamonds, the chest is slowly opened and a blinding bright light shined from inside it, "Go ahead dear" said Matilda as her eyes pointed to the chest.
Hope goes down towards the chest and slowly lowers her hand inside of it and grabs what inside, as she removes her hand from the chest it reveals her to be holding the magic wand, it had a purple handle with a sparkly cyan diamond at its back end and a translucent turquoise sphere at it top decorated with a white glowing shape which resembled the combination of a two star into two different planes inside, and topped off with a small yellow crown at the top
Hope's shoulder emblem a pink heart with a tiny crown on top of both curves starts glowing, she raises the top of the wand at eye level, "ooh what's this" she says as she tries to stick her finger inside it to touch the spinning star
"HOPE DONT" shouted her mother, as soon as hope touched it burnt her finger and she let out a painful screech and fires a yellow glowing beam fires from the wand at some guest who were quick enough to duck, it hits a glowing orange decorative plant crushing it against the wall,
"hehe this could have been worse", Hope said awkwardly, the wreckage catches fire...
"FIRE" yells Sally, the guards that were standing by the walls quickly moved and shoved away all nearby guest as Sally goes and faces the fire here shoulder emblem glows and she fires yellow beam at it from her hands she then she clenches her fist and the beam turns into water extinguishing the fire and a yellow cloud evaporates from it, she quickly turn over to Hope and rushes over to her "ARE YOU OKAY PRINCESS" she exclaimed worryingly.
"I am fine it's just my finger is a little -" before she finishes her sentence Sally picks her up and running with her in her arms and runs up to the door and out of the Palace.
Queen Matilda is left with the guests and lets out an awkward chuckle and says "so who wants some drinks?", "Please help yourself to the finest wines in the whole kingdom" she said as a servant reveals a bunch of wine bottles in gold coating, the guests all rushed to get a sip
"I am telling you I am fine it's just a little scratch its rude for me to leave suddenl-" Hope was interrupted by Sally kicking the door open.
"PA-" Sally yelled before being interrupted by a "SHHHH", she was shushed by a woman with a white robe that cut offs at the shoulder, and a hand crafted necklace made of cotton around her neck, she had red hair tied into a bun and a green plus sign as her shoulder emblem.
"Seriously Sally how many times do I have to tell you to be quiet in here" said healer Pam with frustration she lets out a sigh and asks, "So what seems to be the problem?" Sally pulls out Hope and holds her at arms length right Infront of her Hope lets out a "Hi".
Pam gasps "Oh my princess sorry I didn't know you were coming, are you hurt?"
"No not at all it's ju-" Hope was interrupted yet again it seems like although she is becoming a grownup no one seems to want to listen to her
"She burned herself quickly check up on her" commanded Sally as she lowered Hope to her feet, Pam glanced at her up and down
"Where was she hurt", asked her confused. Hope sheepishly pointed to her left index finger it was a bit red which could be easily seen as it contrasted with her smooth white skin, but it was also accompanied by a yellow 'liquid', Pam conjured a white napkin to clean the site of the injury and singled out the injured finger from Hope's hand and put her hand on it and made into a fist and then she took a deep breath and closed her eyes her shoulder mark started having a green glow for a few seconds and then it suddenly went dim, she opened her hand to find the finger fully healed like it was never even scratched.
"Oh wow t-thanks" said Hope with a smile.
"Oh it's nothing" said pam, she took out her napkin it had some yellow glowing spots of what looks like fluid except its it didn't soak in but floated around it, "I see you can use magic now, what was your first spell" Pam said with excitement.
"I-i just shot this out of the wand" she said as she pointed at liquid on the napkin that started evaporating considerably, she then lowered her voice and talked faster "and it hit a plant and set it on fire" she was saying as she looked at the floor, Pam laughed and Hope was starting to blush.
"Oh don't worry dear we all mess up at the start, when I first started I accidentally broke a boy's arm" Pam said with a laugh.
"Is he okay now?" Hope asked with curiosity
"Well when I was your age healing wasn't what it is today they just put his arm in a cast and said if he was lucky his arm would be usable in three years", "I never was interested in healing like my mom but I wanted to fix my mistake so I studied and practiced for months to focus my healing and one day it just clicked, I got back to him and I was able to heal his arm and this happiness a patient feels when they are treated makes this all worth it" she let out a calm sigh and continued "It was not an easy journey but in just 8 years I was able to reach my peak"
"Eight years?" Hope said in disbelief
"Don't worry your path is way longer than mine my peak is at least four levels lower than you" Pam said with a grin
"It isn't that huge difference right?" Hope inquired hoping her journey wont be in the double digits because that's a very long time
Pam laughed and then said "Oh it way larger than it looks, but don't worry royals don't have a peak at least not one that one knows off" she put her hand on Hope's shoulder "Don't let the long road overwhelm you as long as you are better than yesterday you will be a great princess"
Hope smiled at her and said, "Thanks a lot Pam"
"So is everything alright with her, she stuck her finger into the wand are you sure there wont be any complications" asked Sally
"She will be alright she might have lost her finger if she went deeper and then It will actually a challenge to fix, but this is what pain reflexes are for, it a blessing in disguise", replied Pam
Sally clapped her hands and said "Well we got to go now we cant keep the guests waiting thanks for your help Pam"
Hope looked over to her and said "You should come over it's my birthday you can go change the setting", "No dear being a Healer is big commitment what if someone is in need of assistance and I am not here but I appreciate the gesture, maybe I could arrange my schedule to be there next time, go enjoy yourself".
"Pam the amputee is ready for his second regeneration session" a voice called.
"The what?" exclaimed Hope.
"Oh it's a bit graphic you really don't want to see it, I got to go now send your mother my regards" replied Pam as she ran over to a patient
Sally and Hope went to the door and left.
"You know I was really fine, it was just a scratch" Hope said as she looked up to Sally, "It's kind of rude to just leave the guests hanging I could have just sucked it up-"
Hope tried to continue when Sally muttered under her breath "I won't forgive myself".
"What was that?" asked Hope.
"Nothing, it's just you can never be so sure and no one was stupid enough to stick there finger in the wand I was just making sure but since it wasn't serious we don't need to worry" Sally said with an anxious fake smile, Hope sensed there was something off about her tone but she didn't want to push Sally into an uncomfortable spot so she left it at that
Sally and Hope make it back to the palace and Matilda rushes to her daughter "Oh dear are you ok"
She said as she gave her girl a hug, Everyone was staring and Hope got a bit embarrassed "yeah Mom I am ok" Hope said, Matilda stood up and was about to say something before Hope pre-emptively said, "I know I know it was pretty stupid from me to to do what I did, I know the wand is not a toy and I promise I will be more careful with it" she said while avoiding eye contact
Matilda smiled and said "Well I appreciate that you understand that you messed up but that not what I wanted to say" Hope made eye contact and Matilda continued "As princess and future queen we will have you visit the LOWER RING" Matilda took her daughter's hand "Sure its not the safest or best place in the kingdom but a hermit ruler is a bad ruler"
Hope got extremely excited over this as she always wanted to see the rest of the kingdom the Lower ring, the Outer ring but she was always told no because Sally's word "It's way to dangerous, you are not ready, you aren't old enough" or her mother's word "Is there something there that you cant find at home?, The place isn't very hygienic" but how bad could it be it was still under the rule of the Moonshines. Life in the Upper ring and the palace get boring after a while, why would she wants to stay put there when there a whole world to explore?
"The escorts are waiting for us outside those who want to go with us are welcome to go" Said Matilda looking at the guests with a forced smile almost knowing the reaction. All of them tried to mask there faces of disgust as if Matilda just asked them to bathe in mud or even worse she said that the food at the legendary "façade haut de gamme" was just an overpriced scam. They didn't look very impressed, Matilda coughed and asked "Well?".
One couple went towards the exit and when they got to Matilda the man said "We are truly flattered by your invite my queen but I am afraid we have something important to do" the man paused and scratched his head trying to think of an excuse Hope looked over him and asked
"What's more important to than a trip to see the rest of kingdom its not like we can always get to do it" with an ecstatic smile the woman who was scratching her head stopped as if she got an idea she went over looked to Hope with a stupid fake smile and said
"Well sweetie we forgot to sign up our son for school and registration will be closing today" she turned over to her husband and elbowed him in ribs and asked "Isn't that right honey?"
The man nodded in agreement and they walked out and they led out an audible sigh and when they were just outside of earshot the man told his wife "Moonshines huh? You would think after what happened a decade ago they would get the memo" the woman looked back at the Queen then waved and looked back at her husband and said
"She is weak if this happened to me I will make sure those pigs wish they weren't born".
Following into there footsteps and sensing an opening other guests decided to excuse themselves outside and at this point Matilda stopped resisting she knew some wouldn't want to go but she didn't think that many would go and she looked defeated Hope turned to her and said "Well mom we don't need those nose in the airers it's there loss anyways"
A woman walked up to them "She is right you know in-law" that woman was Hope's paternal aunt Mary, she had short blonde hair and brown eyes wearing a yellow dress for the occasion "The only reason any off these arrogant buffoons came here is societal expectations much like basically everything here" she said while rolling her eyes "and they all dipped the second they had the chance, come on lets go"
As they walked past the doors Sally was standing just outside the door scanning the setting with her eyes, her eyes wandered and locked with Mary "You should relax Sally no need for you to be so tense" she said with a smile she then changed her tone suddenly and said with a frown and a in a low voice that Hope and Matilda couldn't hear "Me and Matilda can protect ourselves and we aren't relying on you and my niece was under my protection since she was six, all you need to do is drive the horses and look menacing" and then she put her hand on her shoulder and smiled and said with an audible voice "So you can feel a lot more at ease dear", Sally tried hid her feeling of guilt with a fake smile "Let's go" said Mary joyfully
Everyone got on the horse driven chariot, just a classical chariot nothing magical about it, it's a very ineffective method of transport but one of the most relaxing ones
"HEEEEEY WAIT FOR ME" yelled a girl from as she was she surfing a purple cloud wearing a long sleeved purple sweater and blue pants as she got closer she tried to slow down by tilting her body backwards but she lost control and started flying at high speeds towards Hope
"EM SLOW DOWN" shouted Hope.
"I CANT BRACE FOR IMPACT" they both closed there eyes with their arms covering there eyes but just before contact she was caught effortlessly by Sally one hand and her cloud in the other she crushed the cloud in her fist into yellow mist that faded away and put the girl on her feet she then crossed her arms and looked down and barked
"Miss Emberlynn Springfield you should know how dangerous using magic without experience is, and you can't just rely on something you can't even responsibly use to make up for your own lack of punctuality"
Ember looked taken aback but she didn't want to look stupid so she snapped back with "I didn't know Hope is celebrating her birthday early in the morning, birthdays are a night activity".
Sally who was crossing her arms now raised her eyebrow and simply replied with,"Lies you were told everyday for the last week not my fault you can't seem to be able to be punctual friend's birthday, do you simply not care?".
Ember now looked embarrassed and now was rolling her finger around her dyed purple hair "M-M-My rooster didn't wake me up" she said with a smile while shrugging her shoulder as if she is asking question and the question was 'will Sally let the lecture go'.
"This doesn't matter now anyways it's that Ems is here" interjected Hope with excitement as she put her arm around Ember's shoulder "We shouldn't be wasting time let's go" she said as she punched her hand up in the sky.
Matilda, Hope, Ember and Mary entered the Chariot while Sally rode one of the two horses moving it while the other was being moved by an over-armoured and visibly nervous man.
"Calm down Edmund its just a short trip by a defined path we will be in an out in an hour or two" commanded Sally looking at Edmund clearly getting tired of his lack of confidence.
"I am trying but its such a big deal, escorting not one not two but three royals into the lower ring, I am not sure if I can do this, If I mess up-- I am too young for the consequences" he said clearly on the edge of panic
Sally slapped her hands on his cheeks "Edmund calm down you can do this I know you can" she said, Edmund seemed to calm down a bit "The whole path is being heavily guarded you and me are the last line of an extremely deep wall of defences we are most likely just going to be there for company" she looked back at the cart and said "and besides it's not like the royals can't protect themselves, they are much stronger than us after all"
"That's what they said about fre-" Edmund mumbled before putting his hand on his mouth mid sentence, Sally expression changed to that of anger.
"What did you just say?" she barked.
Edmund realising his mess up and started shaking "Um- I was talking about ---- the nice weather we are having" he said trying to pretend that this wasn't the stupidest attempt at backtracking, before Sally was going to give him a piece of her mind Mary stuck her head out and said in annoyed tone
"Hey I am not getting any younger here", Sally and Edmund looked forwards and shook the horse reins and they got moving forward
As they got to the edges of the Upper ring they reached translucent yellow barrier "We are reaching the barrier you might feel a tickle" proclaimed Sally.
As the horse crossed the barrier the barrier walls phased through the cart and it phased through Mary and Matilda there shoulder emblems glowed a four pointed star and a diamond respectfully in a yellow hue when it got to Hope and Ember the cart got to a sudden halt and they were thrown forwards Hope fell on her mother while Ember face was slapped into the barrier which was at this point halfway through the cart.
Sally opened the door "Everyone ok" she took one look at Ember and let out an annoyed sigh she dragged her hand out of the cart and asked while trying to hide her frustration "Show me your emblem"
Ember scoffed and tried to tuck back her long sleeves but she couldn't get back enough and said while crossing her arms "I can't and I am not removing my shirt".
Sally wasn't having any of it and from tip of her index made a sharp grey magic beam, she flattened Ember's sleeve and made a small cut in her right shoulder showing a yellow star rotated slightly to the left, after the cut yellow gas evaporated from it "And this is why emblems aren't covered it's common knowledge Springfield" said Sally annoyed.
"My favourite shirt! This was very unnecessary" whined Ember and before she could say anything Sally went back to her horse leaving her alone she scoffed and went back to the cart and sat next to Hope crossing her arms.
"You okay there", asked Hope concerned.
"Yeah I am fine just another lecture", said ember looking at the windows
As Hope looked out the window the lower ring didn't seem so different from home, people dressed and walked smartly roads were clean but something was off she couldn't help but notice everyone wore long sleeves even though it was a summer and it's not proper etiquette and that's something else it was surprisingly hot, She took her head out through the windows "Hello stranger" she greeted a man walking nearby he took one solid look at her and looked towards her mother and Sally who was frowning and her hands free with her emblem glowing, he didn't say anything and turned back and proceeded to speed walk away in a few seconds he ditched the subtlety and ran away, Hope was pretty disappointed and got her head into the cart
"What did I do wrong?", Hope asked.
"Girl it's either because you were too friendly it felt fake" said Ember, Hope looked down "Or they were made to feel unwelcome by misses buzzkill in the driving seat" she remarked
A loud sound of crashing wooden boxes was heard and cart went to a halt
"What was that" commented Mary
"Something that isn't boring" Hope said with excitement before leaving the cart.
"Make sure all of them stay put in the cart I will be gone for a short while" said Sally to Edmund before running to the source of the sound Hope tried to follow her but was body blocked by Edmund with his arms crossed
"Sorry I can't let you go princess, Superior's orders", he glanced to the left of him to seeing Ember touching a fancy table Infront of a café just for it to poof into a yellow cloud,
"Ow splinters" she cried, the yellow cloud fizzled reveal a wooden table barely clinging to its shape with a bunch of makeshift wooden fixes that don't even match in colour
Edmund looked like he just saw a ghost and ran towards Ember who was now transforming outdoor expensive furniture into splinter traps
"Stop touching it" said Edmund before shooting out a grey magical hands towards her subduing her, "What's your deal" he scolded annoyed.
"No what's this place deal why is everything here so fake?" snapped Ember "You hearing this Hope this place is fa-" she then stopped and asked "Aye were is Hope?"
Edmund let her go and pulled on his hair "Oh no no no no no no no" he cried
"Is everything alright where is my daughter?" asked Matilda concerned, Edmund didn't know what to say but before he could make up an explanation Mary interjected
"Oh don't worry Mati she will be ok she is probably with Sally and besides she still has this necklace I gave her so I am sure she will be just fine" Mary said with her hand on Matilda's shoulder "and we can go have some tea and chit-chat while we wait I heard that Gilbert's tea shop has actually potable tea" she suggested Matilda sighed and decided to go with what Mary said and walked towards the shop. "What about me?" asked Ember, Edmund turned towards her with anger and barked "You are staying right here!".
"Sally where are you?" called Hope as she was walking she saw a little girl wearing a cute pink dress and smooth brown hair walking alone Infront of her, she approached her and asked
"Hey do you happen to see a tall lady around here?" she tapped on her shoulder to get her attention and suddenly a cloud of yellow gas evaporated out of her Hope and the little girl coughed and as the smoke cleared the little girl was wearing a poorly knit patchwork of randoms scraps of fabric and her hair was covered in dirt she had a brown circle on the side of her shoulder, Hope froze in shock "I- I am so sorry, it was an accident" she apologised "I can go get you a new dress or--" the girl just looked at Hope her eyes glanced her wand which was in her right hand as well as her royal emblem and then she started hyperventilating and burst into tears.
Hope got on to her knees and she gently put her hands on the girl's shoulder "Calm down calm down, it's alright, It's not your fault but mine"
"P-P-pwease do-don hu-hur meeee" the girl sobbed.
"What hurt you? no no no no" Hope explained trying to figure out from where the girl got the idea
Hope hugged the girl "Here calm down see I am friendly" she soothed, the girl seemed to calm down a bit and she started sniffing
She let her go and asked "So what's your name?"
"R-R-Rosie" replied Rosie.
"Ok Rosie I am so sorry for ruining your dress, do you remember were you got it from?" she asked
"Ms Bea had guys gib it to us" Rosie said
"Misses Bea huh" she wondered out loud "Well can you tell me were misses Bea is"
"Sowwy I can't tell you misses moonnnn" Rosie was saying before she looked she wanted to cry again
"Please don't cry" Hope pleaded "You don't need to tell me where you live just wait" Hope passed her wand to her left hand and put her now free hand to her pocket and pulled out a purple wallet and she pulled out a golden note with 50 written on it she passed the note to Rosie and said "Here give this to misses Bea and tell her I am so sorry for destroying your dress also" Rosie grabbed the note and stared at it, Hope pulled some wrapped candy she got from the party "Her have some candy too" the girl put her the note in her pocket and grabbed the wrapped candy she struggled with it a bit and she then passed it back
"Open it please" Rosie asked
"Oh you can't? it's quite simple here" Hope said she gently tapped the candy her emblem glowed for a moment and the wrapping fizzed out.
Rosie put the candy in her mouth and quickly chewed and swallowed it, she then gave Hope a hug, she let go after a moment "Thank you miss, Ms Bea says Moosines are scawy but aren't scawy"
"Scary why would we be scary" Hope asked in disbelief with a smile
Rosie looked around and said "I am sowwy I need to go" she turned back and ran away and took a turn and was just out of sight.
"You couldn't just stop causing trouble for one day? what did we pay you for?" Hope heard Sally barking.
The sound of Sally's voice came from an alleyway, as Hope entered the alley the clean white paint started fading into rotting maroon bricks and the smell became foul coming from the open dumpster "Ewwwww" Hope said as she lowered the lid to try and lessen the stench
"Hey you know it's rude to close the lid on someone trying to fetch themselves a meal" a bald man barked as he popped out like a jack in the box he had a white beard wearing over shoulder strapped brown pants with a black plastic bag for a shirt and a metal can of beans for a hat and his left eye with a grey iris spinning his shoulder emblem only consisted of a simple brown circle, Hope screamed and ran away "Oh beans was that a Moonshine?" the man asked himself "Well I probably should skip town" he said to himself with a goofy smile while snapping his fingers.
Hope stopped running and started panting "Now you are lucky I am not here in head bashing duty or I would have sent you to a one way trip to the Outer ring and the monsters there could deal with you" Hope heard Sally scolding, she walked to the end of the alleyway the place beyond it was extremely different people clothes were worn out in which the holes were covered up by half baked sewn rotting fabric the road didn't exist it was simply a dirt undefined path and walls were all made of rotting bricks same as that of the alley, windows were broken and the stench of garbage filled the air, Hope saw Sally tying up a bunch of muscular men with a magic rope.
Sally glanced over and saw Hope "Princess what are you doing here?" she asked with dismay the rope holding the gangsters vanished they got up and shook of the dust and looked up and saw Hope and they all ran away in terror "Moonshine here run awway". All of a sudden all the people went indoors and the windows were sealed shut with wood and hammered with nails and just like that the place looked like a ghost town.

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The following two brain scans were provided by the Neuro-Warfare branch of the Halcyon Security Division (HSD) for the purpose of analyzing the thoughts, behaviors, and information of notorious gangsters Vincent 'Troy' Cohen and Bruno (Deadname: Koraak Tel-Char). At the point of the recording of this archival shared, Bruno has since received his rebirth therapy, and Vincent is currently serving a long-term rehabilitative and reeducative sentence in the Erebus Supermax Prison on Io.
Warning: the contents of this archival shared may be especially disturbing to some audiences. Viewer discretion is advised.
Warning: the contents of this archival shard are for the sole purpose of analyzing the thought patterns and memories of certain degenerate criminals in an effort to ascertain vital information that can be used to eliminate their organizations. Only staff with clearance level Omega may view this archival shared, and the viewership of this archival shared by anyone of inadequate clearance level will lead to twenty years in prison and a fine of over a hundred thousand credits.
Booting up memory scan: Vincent 'Troy' Cohen, November 4th, 2446…
Loading and processing firmware data… translating… memories and subconscious simulated…
Beginning archival shard presentation…
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"Do you have visuals of the target, Troy?"
I knelt down in the alleyway, the bodies of me and my partners shrouded in long, waterproof, ashen-gray overcoats the shade of dirty street scum that we wore to ward off the constant heavy rainfall the color of osmium. Our faces were covered in a mix of scrapped respirators, visors, or full metal face masks carved with intricate designs to hide our identities. On our waists were our badges of honor: leather belts studded with interlocked rivets made from blackened titanium, each buckle forged of silver and shaped into the head of our gang's symbol, the black mamba. We hid amongst the shadows of the dark midday of Halcyon City, the heavy, oppressive rains blanketing the roads paved obsidian-black with asphalt and weathered concrete walkways. The street lamps were always on, like beacons of false hope in a storm of melancholy.
The city was dark and dreary as always, the planet of Proxima Centauri B, renamed Dawn's Lamentation over a century ago, orbited the red dwarf star of Proxima Centauri, and the atmosphere was thick with natural smog and ever-storming rain clouds. That didn't dissuade people from living here: there was plenty of money to be had for shrewd industrialists and hardworking pioneers, even in the urban sprawl. But that life also came with risks, especially for those on the bottom of the totem pole.
I was a ganger, and we were criminals; full stop. I won't assault you with some spiel about how we're the good guys fighting oppression because, at the end of the day, we could be just as bad, if not worse, than Halcyon's Security Division, or the HSD for short. We were traffickers, killers, extortionists, and money launderers. We dealt with everything from stolen tech and military-grade hardware to hard drugs and sentients.
Yes, sentients. We trafficked sentients, but not in the way you might think. They weren't prisoners, in fact, we were their saviors if they had the cash. We had developed a reputation for fighting the power, but it was still business: sure, freeing captives from the clutches of the Protectorate. The disruption of its many oppressive organizations held a certain satisfaction in my heart for sure, but we didn't help those who couldn't pay unless someone else paid on their behalf. It was about making sure me and my gang, my family, could live a decent life for another day.
It helped that most of us joined after leaving the state yard for partaking in acts of 'degeneracy' and 'anti-xenopet illegalities' as if those terms meant anything anymore other than that we were a threat to the local status quo. It was hard to pick up a job as a former inmate when even in something as harsh and backbreaking as a job in the iridium mines near the poles when the employment office had you blacklisted as a degenerate, which lead to the formation of many of the gangs: we needed to make a living somehow, and when all social programs were cut off from you unless you submitted for 're-education' and the only way to put food on the table was subverting, breaking, or even downright fighting the law, you did what you had to do or you died on the streets a scorned beggar.
It wasn't like the HSD made it easy for us on even a good day: the local HSD units were armed to the teeth with advanced, military-grade hardware that you'd often see on the front lines of the Second Authority War: armored assault transports, a myriad of advanced war droids, all sorts of chemical countermeasures that made tear gas seem like putting the garden hose on mist mode, and of course advanced firearms. Add that to the fact that they were authorized to use deadly force when they deemed it necessary and you had a ruthless, heartless, and nearly unstoppable enemy. But we could make that work: we weren't trying to stop them, just to withstand them.
"Yeah, I got eyes on the prize, Koraak; seven armored transports, two for droids, five for prisoners."
Today wasn't a day for a normal job: we were getting bolder, cockier, more ambitious. Our numbers had swelled for the last few years after the raid at Barnard's Star and the fall of the Blood Dragon Mafia. Their leader, Saito Yasuhide, had committed seppuku as their manor burned, and his twin sons had gone down fighting rather than allowing themselves to be captured simply to face a firing squad. In the aftermath, many of the family's associates had fled to the surrounding systems, and with the sheer size and scope of the criminal underworld found here, it was no wonder that many people who had developed skills of the less legal variety had decided to form ranks with the gangs, and with them they brought guns, tech, knowledge, contacts, and even something that we thought wasn't possible beforehand: a semblance of peace between the gangs, or at least the closest thing to peace that gangs could cultivate effectively. With the fall of the Blood Dragons, we saw the writing on the wall, and the writing couldn't have been clearer: work together or die together.
"Sounds like a massacre, Troy: are you sure we can handle seven?"
"We ain't got no choice, Cinder: this job's double the usual rate, and that's not including the weapons and gear we could scrounge if this goes well," I hissed, my eyes scanning for any resistance. There were at least four guards for each van, not to mention at least eight droids in total, meaning that we were already outnumbered, but we had the element of surprise: we could make it work. "So put your balls in your purse and get ready to spill some blood."
Koraak snorted at our antics, which sounded like someone pulling the ripcord on a lawnmower. He was a veteran Russu Corsair, and while his past of slaving, raiding, and killing was unsavory, so were the lives we'd lived, so who were we to judge? All we cared about was that he was a brutal and capable fighter and a loyal brother in arms. It turned out that being a ganger wasn't much different from being a Corsair: you lived and died by a code of honor, you fought to the death for your brothers, and you lived to die for the sake of your gang and your family, simple as that. In a strange, ironic way, it was an incredibly honest way of life: we were under no illusions as to what we were, what we did, and why we did it, and we'd long since accepted it. The Russu related to us in that aspect, in many ways I could respect, which is why I hated what the Protectorate was doing, and why I couldn't grasp how most of humanity could just collectively lose their marbles so long ago. What had happened for us to deem all other life below us in such a demeaning and infantilizing way?
The Russu were a race of tall, muscle-bound Saurians with avian features, and Koraak was no exception: reaching almost seven feet in height and weighing over four hundred and fifty pounds, he could be an absolute menace if he so desired. His skin was covered in stubby, knobby scales and dense plumage, with elegant feathers adorning the ridges along his back as well as his forearms, elbows, knees, and the crests on his head. He almost looked like how paleontologists described velociraptors, with razor-sharp talons, feathers shaded in vibrant greens, reds, and purples, and a maw full of sharp teeth, but at the tip of his snout was a sharp, beak-like growth meant for ripping flesh off the bone.
The Russu were strange as hell, but they also looked almost cute in the same way a fully grown alligator was cute: they were obviously dangerous, but humans would always have this innate desire to anthropomorphize them and to pet them for some inexplicable reason, although common sense usually prevented that, at least amongst the very few of us left that were sane.
"Shut up, Troy! All I'm saying is that that'll be rough, and you know it," hissed Cinder. Cinder was a tall black man whose coffee-colored skin was covered in tattoos. He wore an ebony mechanic's jumpsuit with metal inserts underneath his grimy overcoat covering his body and a faded black respirator on his face. His eyes were a startling blue that seemed sorely out of place, and his hair was braided into thick cornrows along his scalp. He wore a pair of heavy black combat boots and palmed his compact shotgun in his hands, the square barrel less than seven inches. Like a lot of the weapons the Black Mambas carried on their persons and dealt in, they fired caseless ammunition; in Cinder's case it was 16x40mm caseless shotshells filled with depleted uranium micro-flechetes no thicker than a toothpick. Cinder nervously fiddled with the detachable tube magazine underneath the barrel, his hands shaking. Despite the shit I have him, I didn't blame him for being anxious: I was anxious too, even if I refused to show it. The biting cold of unease and pessimism was in my stomach, and I ran all the way that this job could go wrong in my head over and over.
"Just hold yourself together, this ain't anything we haven't done before, there's just more of it," I reassured Cinder, "besides, we're not alone; we have reinforcements across the street. We'll make it out of this alive."
Cinder nodded almost absentmindedly, his eyes downcast and his breathing shallow. I turned from him and back to Koraak, who was making sure he had everything on his person; he had a synthetic leather bandoleer across his chest that contained the heavy eight guage depleted uranium slugs he kept loading and unloading into his much larger, longer, and more traditional shotgun he nicknamed ‘carnage’ and several leather straps that held his Tu'shan daggers: traditional Russu pyramidal blades forged from a silvery alloy with all three edges serrated and the tip barbed to leave behind horrible, gaping wounds that gushed blood. They were wickedly sharp and absolutely straight like a stiletto, and the hilts and pommels were beautifully decorated. He wore no clothes underneath his overcoat to cover the countless scars and blemishes he's earned in combat across his chest and abdomen, and instead of a normal respirator or visor, he simply wore a hood over his head and some traditional Russu facial armor to protect his mouth, eyes, and cheeks.
"You ready to fight, Koraak? The caravan will pick up and leave soon."
Koraak was silent for a moment before nodding, a human gesture he had picked up after serving as a soldier with the Black Mambas for years. "I'm always ready to fight," he said before lifting up his shotgun and aiming down the sights at the reinforced front wheels of the first armored car in the caravan. He exhaled and fired, the slug ripping through both front tires and causing them to deflate and fall apart. The echo of the shot rang through the alleyway and the street, causing pedestrians to panic and flee the scene as heavily armored guards poured out of the side doors of the armored cars and unholstered their carbines.
"Go, now!" I shouted, and both me and Cinder rushed out into the fray, our guns raised. Koraak was right behind the two of us, providing covering fire with his shotgun. Several guards fell quickly, Koraak's precise fire and the sheer force of the depleted uranium slugs putting them down for good as their heads were vaporized or their chest cavities were turned to mush. He emptied the tube with one final shot that painted the grey matter of a security guard on the door of one of the armored cars, then racked the shotgun and expertly loaded it in threes, his hands deft and agile as he reached for more slugs faster than any human.
With the cacophony of our initial assault, more Black Mambas poured out from the alleyways and the subways, armed to the teeth with all manner of weapons; shotguns, submachine guns, pistols, machetes, baseball bats, and all manner of homemade explosives. Molotovs and more potent concoctions shattered against the asphalt, herding in the caravan guards with their volatile contents as they were quickly gunned down. The assault was working, and we were winning.
Then I heard the robotic whine of a combat droid activating, and my heart sank. One of the armored cars in the back activated the four combat droids it held, the robotic assault units detaching from their charging ports on the sides of the large van and began to form up, each armed with a terrifying array of deadly weapons meant to quash any and all resistance. They were blocky, soulless, utilitarian things that stood at eight feet tall, with flat feet meant for stomping and blades, grasping claws designed to lacerate flesh and shatter bone. On each shoulder was a weapon: on the left was a multi-barrel rotary grenade launcher loaded with 15mm concussion grenades, and on the right was a burst-fire splinter cannon. They were all painted a dull grayish-green, the color of Halcyon's Security Division, although some had a few decorations on them: the one closest to me had a bit of graffiti on the side that said Mr. Hugs in Comic Sans, which I couldn't decide whether that made it more or less terrifying. They split up without hesitation and began to scan the chaotic battlefield, their single, red, beady lenses the security forces had the gall to call eyes focusing on specific targets to eliminate.
An entire group of Black Mambas was torn to pieces by a cloud of flechettes as one of the droids fired a withering three-round burst of shotshells from the four gauge splinter cannon mounted on its shoulder. Another picked up a Black Mamba in its hand and crushed her skull effortlessly before tossing her limp body to the side, its single, red, remorseless robotic eye tracking a new target. Most bullets that struck their thick armored chassis simply bounced off, and those that could pierce the armor didn't seem to phase the droids whatsoever, merely notifying them of a new potential target.
"Damnit," I shouted as I gunned down another guard only for two more to take his place. "Cinder! We gotta pop open the cars and scram! Get the maglock cutters!"
Cinder rushed and slid over through a dirty puddle, pulling out a maglock cutter from the inside of his coat and slipping it onto the back door of the first van. It immediately went to work, drilling through the maglock with a high-powered plasma torch nozzle, and within ten seconds we heard the telltale clunk of the maglock separating. I yanked the door open and ordered I side, ready to escort the prisoners out… only for my face to contort in shock and horror.
The back was empty. There was not a single soul inside of the back brig of the armored car.
"What the fuck…" Cinder gasped, his eyes wide with shock. "What the actual fuck… what the fuck is this, Troy?"
"I… I don't…" I stuttered the sounds of battle and carnage drowned out by the sound of blood rushing in my ears. All five cars were supposed to be filled with recently captured Russu from the front lines ready to be housed in the local Xenopet-Megaplex for processing and conditioning. The fact that this one was empty…
Suddenly, it all hit me at once with the force of a freight train, but it was too late. "We were set up, Cinder; our fucking client either squealed or was crooked to begin with…"
"Fucking bitch!" Cinder shouted as he spun around in an enraged arch, anger growing in his eyes. He aimed his shotgun at an approaching security guard and reduced his upper body to a fine red mist with a cacophony of shotgun blasts. "We gotta get everyone who's left out of here! Do you know what this means? The Jurors will be here soon, and then we're all going down! We gotta go, fuck the job!"
I grit my teeth. Not the Jurors, anything but the Jurors.
"Fine, gather everyone who's left and we'll slip through the sewers, the droids are too bulky to follow us there…"
As I spoke, my eyes wandered to the seventh and final armored car, the second of the droid cars, and my blood froze. Not only were all four ports empty, but they were also smaller and more shallow than the ports for the combat droids. That could only mean one thing.
"Oh fuck! Cinder, we gotta get our Russu members out of here! They've got arachnid droids!"
Arachnid droids were the stuff of nightmares. Resembling blocky, robotic arachnids the size of a manhole cover, they were specifically designed to take down sentient aliens, specifically the Russu, using sickeningly non-lethal means. They were equipped with full-body adaptive cloaking to blend in with their environments, paralytic agents that they could inject into their victims, built-in taser barbs, psychedelic gas ports for crowd-control, and a narrow-coned cacophony canon that disabled the Russu using incredibly high-pitched sounds that only they could hear, forcing them onto their knees and clutching the backs of their heads where their auditory organs were stored in agony. But worst of all was their stygian spinnerets: special ports near the end of their robotic abdomens that excreted a viscous, latex-like substance made up of millions of nano-bots. This substance could be used to render Russu blind, deaf, and mute by having it forced onto their faces, the black substance growing and enveloping their heads and working its way into every orifice. It was completely permeable to the standard atmosphere, but any Russu who had been 'webbed' was completely helpless and essentially captured, and the 'webbing' was both nearly indestructible and nigh impossible to remove without a triple-encrypted override key that was found in every arachnid droid's code, which was corrupted when the droid was destroyed or hacked into. Once you were 'webbed', you were essentially captured and the standard protocol was to leave you to the wolves since the nano-bots could be tracked, endangering the entire gang.
I turned just as I heard the deafening sound of Koraak discharging his shotgun, and I saw him squaring off against one of the assault droids. The droid has obviously been programmed to not use lethal force against Russu if possible, as instead of simply killing Koraak with it's shoulder-mounted splinter cannon, it approached with its claws extended, blades retracted. Koraak continued to back away and fire, pumping the droid full of depleted uranium slugs, its armor crumbling inward as the slugs pierced its chassis and damaged its internal cyberstructure. Eventually, Koraak ran out of slugs and instinctively reached to his bandoleer only to find that he had no more shells left at all, and he drew one of his knives and his sidearm, a simple high-caliber handgun. He tried to take down the droid with his handgun, but the bullets didn't even seem to affect the droid upon penetration, it's claws still extended as it attempted to apprehend Koraak.
In the corner of my vision, as I watched Koraak battle with the droid, I noticed a faint shimmer in the air on one of the black streetlight poles that was right behind him. I focused on it and blinked, believing my eyes had deceived me for a moment before realizing that it was actually a cloaked arachnid droid stalking Korvaak, ready to pounce and incapacitate him.
Before I could shout, it leaped from the pole and landed on Korvaak, causing him to shout in surprise while it began to coagulate its horrifying stygian webbing to disable Korvaak. Korvaak tried to wrestle it off of him, but the droid was agile and fast, clinging onto Korvaak and skittering around across his upper body as he attempted to grab it, forcibly wrapping the sticky black liquid across his face as he gagged like a spider wrapping up a fly. I rushed towards him to try and help, but I felt pain explode in my ribs as I was struck with the arm of the closest combat droid and launched into the chassis of a parked car, the metal denting from the sheer force of impact. I groaned in pain as I saw stars and my head spun, and just then I felt a blinding light be cast over me.
“Drop your weapons and kneel with your hands on your head, or you will be pacified with deadly force!” Shouted a loud, artificially deepened voice from above. “I repeat, drop your weapons and kneel with your hands on your head! Neither hostility nor hesitation will be tolerated!”
It was the Jurors, I could feel the air being pushed around from the thrusters on their drop ships, and I could hear screams and shouts as my fellow Black Mambas were quickly gunned down. I couldn’t see well since I was seeing double, but I could hear the slaughter as my eyes dimmed and I began to lose consciousness, my regrets crawling up my throat like vomit.
I’m sorry was all I could think as everything finally went dark, and the sounds of chaos, destruction, and combat faded away.
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Memory halted due to loss of consciousness. Booting next available memory in shard…
Booting up memory scan: Koraak Tel-Char Bruno, November 5th, 2446…
Loading and processing firmware data… translating… memories and subconscious simulated…
Beginning archival shard presentation…
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“Good morning, sleepyhead; it’s time for breakfast.”
My eyes shot open. I was not in the street anymore, nor was I home in my bed with my mate. I knew instantly that something was horribly wrong. I tried to stand up, but I couldn’t gain the leverage to do so: my ankles had been shackled together with magnetic cuffs and my arms were forced together in front of me.
I was wearing some kind of thick shirt. It was warm, fluffy, and comfortable on the inside, but it still made me incredibly uncomfortable that my arms didn’t have a free range of motion. I looked down to see that I was wearing some human garment I had heard about before, a straightjacket maybe?
The entire room was padded: the walls, the floor, even the ceiling. There was no bed or furniture; the floor was soft enough to serve as a bed in itself. There was nothing else except for the soft reddish-orange lights on the ceiling that somehow made me sleepy. I blinked slowly for a moment, my body screaming at me to just lay back down and lose consciousness, but I couldn’t do that: I needed to figure out where I was and how to escape.
Then I noticed who was speaking to me: it was a short human female, with crow's feet around her blue eyes, blonde hair braided down her back, and freckles all over her face. She had a soft smile on her lips, and her forehead was slightly crinkled. She wore a full-body white lab suit with a white overcoat and a pair of glasses for snugly on her face.
"There we go, now I can see those pretty eyes, such a beautiful shade of teal," she cooed softly, "You're such a handsome boy, even with all those scars: I'm sure you'll be adopted very quickly once we get you fixed up."
Fear gripped my heart as I began to piece all the evidence together. I had been captured; I was no longer on Halcyon, and instead, I was in one of the horrific space-born facilities I had heard so much about from the inside agents. I started to hyperventilate and squawk like a newborn hatchling, my eyes dilating in panic. This couldn't be happening! This has to be a nightmare!
The human woman merely wrapped her arms around me and pulled me into an embrace, cradling my head under her chin and speaking softly. I couldn't bite at her or claw at her: I was muzzled and wearing a straight jacket, so I had no choice but to allow her to coddle me.
"It's okay, sweetheart: I understand you're scared, but Julie's here to make all the pain and bad thoughts go away," she said as if she was comforting a child, which made anger blossom in my chest indignantly. "I'll be your caretaker for the next few months, and I'm going to make sure you're healthy, happy, and most importantly safe while you're under our care. I'm sorry to say that includes your restraints and restrictive clothing, but we have to make sure you aren't a threat to yourself or others before we can determine if it's a good idea to remove you from suicide watch."
I growled under my muzzle. Suicide watch? They must have had a lot of instances of Russu taking their own lives after being captured, something I wished I had been able to do before that damnable droid launched itself onto me and…
I shuddered at the thought of the black, viscous substance forcing itself into my nostrils and down my throat and windpipe, gagging me and rendering me completely helpless. It was so cold, so harsh, like slime, and when I had tried to tear it off of my face it merely attached itself to my claws and bound my talons together. I remember squirming on the ground as it enveloped me, unable to see, hear, or speak, and then everything went dark in an instant. It was the most horrible thing I had ever experienced, which was saying something.
"You alright, sweetheart? Oh, I know, you're probably hungry! Here, try some of this." She held up a piece of what looked like raw bacon and wiggled it in front of me before reaching out to remove my muzzle. In an instant, I attempted to snap at her only for pain to blossom in my forehead and my eyes to roll up in my head as I convulsed. It was like something was attempting to drill through my skull from the inside, and every breath felt empty and labored.
"Now, that didn't feel very nice, did it? This is why we have countermeasures in place because we can't trust you yet, sweetheart! Don't worry, we'll work on breaking you of all those bad behaviors and habits while you're here; after all, a well-trained pet is a happy pet!" She began to stroke the crests on my head as I slowly recovered, and she snugly fit the muzzle back onto my snout. "But I won't hold it against you this time, sweetheart; you're just scared and confused, but I'll make all the pain go away."
I struggled in the straight jacket, trying my best to break out of it, but it was no use. Eventually, I became exhausted and despondent, allowing my new caretaker to have her way with me as she gently ran her fingers through my feathers and along my ridges, quietly speaking to me in a hopeless attempt to cheer me up. She seemed genuinely concerned for my well-being, which concerned me even further: who could be this naturally twisted while attempting to be as benevolent and kindhearted as possible?
I felt the pain and terror build up in my chest, the anxiety from what horrific activities I imagined they had planned for me here. I couldn't take the infantilization, the lack of any autonomy, the dehumanization, and what I feared the most was if the rumors of 'rebirth' were true: would they take my personhood from me?
Suddenly, I felt her whisper to me. "Don't worry sweetheart, I know you're so scared and confused, but I promise you everything will be okay: it's going to be your birthday soon, and then everything will get better." She ran her fingers through the feathers along my crest lovingly. "It will be such a wonderful day, and then we'll choose for you the most wonderful family, and you'll spend the rest of your life happy in your forever home! Doesn't all of that sound wonderful?"
I wanted to die. I wanted to disappear. I didn't want to lose myself, not like this, not to these monsters!
"It'll be your birthday soon," she said wistfully as if she was remembering similar events to this in the past like I wasn't the first she'd done this too, "and you'll never be sad again."
I realized that I wasn't the first the stay in this particular cell, and I knew for certain that I wouldn't be the last: I'd end up like my brother, a broken, erased mess of a pathetic creature, reduced to nothing more than a pet for these humans to amuse themselves with.
"We took the liberty of picking out a nice name for you, sweetheart! Now, let me just slip this little programming chip into the port slot on your occipital bone, and... there we go! It will also help you calm down a bit and adjust."
I felt the chip begin to invade my mind, suppressing my thoughts. What made me me was slowly being ripped out of my mind. I couldn't remember my name my name is Bruno, and I needed to get out! I can't let them do this to me! Somebody help me! I was a good boy.
##Do not think. You are a good boy.##
I tried to scream, but my voice wouldn't work: I had trouble forming any words at all, the confusion clouding my mind like wet, slimy eels curling around my brain and sinking their teeth into its folds like needles. I couldn’t scream any longer, because I had nothing left: the chip was slowly beginning to take everything from me, robbing me of my identity and branding a new one into my psyche with a white-hot iron. Julie simply held me close, attempting to reassure me as I awaited the inevitable demise of my personhood. Soon I would be just like my brother: erased. My mind would be shaped into the mind of a loyal plaything, like a Dog.
##Relax. Allow caretaker [Julie] to comfort you. You will let go of your burden.##
Soon, everything was a blur. I quickly found myself resting my head in her lap as she whispered to me and fed me, my eyes bleary and my head fuzzy. I couldn't remember my name anymore My name was Bruno, and I needed to break free from this trance relax, and allow her to help me; good boys didn't resist help.
##Good Boy. Do not think. You are a good boy.##
You can't... I...
##Good boy.##
I wouldn't… good boys don't… I…
##Good boy##
I was a good boy… I was a good boy…
I was… I was… a good… boy…
Someone help me, please! I don't want to be erased!
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The following script is from episode #343 of Halcyon After Dark, a popular late-night and current events talk show hosted by Melinda Carter. This specific episode was sponsored in part by the Halcyon Security Division, with Director Lochlin O'Brien joining as a guest star to talk about the changing crime statistics in Halcyon City and the HSD's recent successes in busting organized crime as well as their plans for addressing the growing criminal underworld.
MC: Good evening Halcyon! I'm your host, Melinda Carter, and you're watching Halcyon's most popular late-night talk show, Halcyon After Dark!
The crowd claps and cheers as Melinda walks on stage and sits behind her desk, her glittering red dress waving as she does so from the special effects.
MC: Tonight we have a very special guest here to tell us about the state of crime in the city and his plans on resolving it: please put your hands together for the HSD's very own Director, Lochlin O'Brien!
The crowd cheers some more as HSD Director Lochlan O'Brien, a tall, muscular, caucasian male in his early forties with red hair and a well-trimmed beard steps into the room, waving at the crowd with a bright smile. He sits in the armchair angled next to Melinda's desk and gives her his full attention.
MC: It's so good to have you on the show, Director! Tell me, how are you doing on this fine evening?
LO: I'm doing excellent, Melinda: every day I wake up feeling fulfilled knowing I'm serving Halcyon to the best of my abilities and then some."
MC: That's the spirit, Director! Now, I know this question is just on everyone's lips, so I have to ask: how successful was the recent gang bust? I heard HSD forces took out dozens of gang members and liberated at least a dozen Russu Hounds from their abusive clutches, but I know that everyone in the audience and at home wants to know the numbers.
LO: I'd be glad to tell you, but I do have to preface this by saying that we still lost a lot of good officers that day, and while we did strike a crippling blow to one of Halcyon's biggest gangs, it doesn't change the fact that each death is a tragedy, and we're taking steps to prevent them in the future. That being said, those valiant officers did not sacrifice themselves in vain: we had over a dozen confirmed kills and several arrests, including the rescue of several corrupted Russu hounds.
MC: That's excellent, Director: proof that even when the number of degenerates and scum grow by the day, the HSD will always be here to keep the citizens of Halcyon safe.
LO: Absolutely, Melinda, and we're always working tirelessly to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of our units, as well as racing to stay several steps ahead of the many gangs of Halcyon at all times. My newest goal as Director is to vastly increase the funding given to our Robotics Department and our Neuro-Warfare Department to potentially reduce the number of casualties we may experience in the future, as well as to quickly and effectively detain, and if necessary, eliminate criminals. Within the next decade, I want to double the number of automated units each Security Platoon is assigned: droids are the future of public safety as well as countless other industries, and it would be foolish to be left behind.
MC: That is quite a lofty goal, Director: what about the displaced jobs from the increased automation? What will the union say?
LO: And to that, I say: what misplaced jobs? We aren't replacing our honored and beloved service members with droids, Melinda, we are simply supplementing our units with more droids to ensure that future gang assaults end with fewer HSD casualties and more gang members in prison or eliminated, simple as that.
MC: That makes much more sense, Director, thanks for clarifying. Now, I have one more question that I'm sure much of Halcyon wants to know the answer to before we take a short break: what plans do you and your fellow directors have to make long-term progress in reducing crime beyond just increasing funding? Have you proposed any plans to strike at the source of where crime and degeneracy flourish?
OL: That's an excellent question, and one I am proud to answer: my constituents and I have been working tirelessly on a two-step plan to greatly reduce crime levels in Halcyon. Step one would be to prevent people from becoming criminals and degenerates at all in the first place: a lot of young men and women, but especially young men, have lost either one or both parents or even a sibling, aunt or uncle, or even a close friend by the brutality of the Second Authority War, and while the service of their lost loved ones will always be recognized and honored, many of these young men and women are left bitter, angry and lost without the guidance these people give them in their lives. Oftentimes they seek to fill that void with others who claim to relate to them: career criminals. These criminals will fill their heads with lies and false narratives to make them feel like they're fighting back against the 'evil protectorate government' that took their loved ones from them by sending them off to war when in reality it was the rogue Xenopets of the Triarchy that took them away by resisting their just and inevitable unburdening.
In response, I have proposed a slew of special programs that will make sure local law enforcement and HSD officers are present and contributing to their local community, and we'll be providing easy and light job openings for youngsters and teens looking to make a career for themselves in the force when they grow up. We want to let these lost souls know that there are people who care about them, people who understand them and that you shouldn't turn to degeneracy to feel fulfilled. We want to help the youth of our great society soar to new heights!
MC: That sounds like a wonderful beginning to your plan, Director, but what about the second step?
LO: Well, the second step is to prevent criminals and degenerates from becoming repeat criminals. Sure, they've made their mistakes, some worse than others, but they're only human like the rest of us. Some of them have been through hell: some are traumatized veterans who don't know how to adapt to normal life, others were recruited when they were young and don't know that there's a better way to live, and even more are mentally ill. We're alone in this galaxy, and we can't leave so many people behind. That's why we've come up with an excellent solution: we've set up isolated communities on distant moons and frontier planets where these criminals can be reeducated, rehabilitated, and allowed to repay their debt to society. When they're deemed 'reformed' and have graduated from our program, they'll be granted a hefty stipend and their criminal record will be deemed irrelevant, allowing them to reintegrate and become functioning members of our proud society.
MC: all of these sound like incredible steps forward in the fight to better our society and make real progress, Director. Sadly, we do have to step away for a moment, but you best believe I'll be back, Halcyon, and we'll be asking the Director here some burning questions about allegations over the quality of life Erubus Supermax! Now, a word from our sponsors!
Halcyon Xenopet-Megaplex! Everything your xenopet could ever need in one place! Adoption is now free-
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Good, you’re still alive! The rest of this shard appears to be corrupted, which means this particular trail seems to have run cold here, but do not despair; you need to keep searching. Find out what happened. Find the truth.I cannot guide you any longer: they've already found me, and if I remain in contact with you they'll find you as well. Take the archival database, and see what you can piece together. Maybe if we discover what truly happened we can put an end to this madness once and for all. I'm counting on you. Don't cry for me, I don't fear death, but I fear what they'll do to me to get to you: there are far worse fates than death, after all.

To put it plainly, I need to divorce my wife. I don't know if I love her anymore, and I don't think she loves or is even particularly fond of me anymore. My best guess is that she keeps up appearances for the ladder part of that sentence because we have 4 kids together. We have been together for almost a decade and have been married for 5 almost 6 years now. We haven't tried couples councling at all, but to be honest, I don't think that would make a difference for either of us at this point. We have both made mistakes, and I am going to try to explain this with as much objectivity as possible. To start, as of now, I am 30m, and she is 30f. We met while both working for a moderately popular sandwich chain when I was 20, and she was 20-21. Things started as kind of a whirlwind, but she showed interest first, and at the time, I didn't have anything to lose, so I thought, "eff it I may as well give this a chance." We had lots of s*x, and things were great getting to know each other while enjoying each other's bodies. I am a little fuzzy on the exact timing on when exactly we decided to be exclusive, but if I were to venture a guess, it would be 6 or 8 months after we met. Fast forward like a year or so, and she ends up pregnant with my oldest son mind you we had talked about it at least once or twice and I had made it known getting married and having kids hadn't exactly ever been in any of my plans (not that ive ever really made plans) but that for sure wasnt apart of anything I had really wanted out of life. It wasn't that I didn't want a life partner, but the idea of getting the government involved in my relationship just didn't jive with me and that I could be happy in the relationship without it knowing that we could still be together, love, and take care of each other for the rest of our lives. I didn't want kids because I didn't want to have to raise tiny humans in this crazy world we live in, and I didn't think I would ever be able to afford them. We moved in together into our first apartment we both had our names on. We have the baby, and it was tough, but we were giving it our best shot. Now I know this next part is going to sound like I was just lying, but bare with me. Fast forward another 6 to 8 months, and she's pregnant again. The second pregnancy scared me even more than the first because I already thought I couldn't afford 1, so how in the hell am I going to afford 2. I thought I was going to lose it, but for the most part, I think I kept it under wraps (how true that is, I have no idea). I must have been doing pretty well because she started to try to reconnect with her family so that our kids could know her side of their extended family. If you're wondering why she needed to reconnect, it is because her family is deeply religious, and she is not, nor am I, which is part of the reason I think we were able to gel so well in the beginning of our relationship. She had spent the 3 years prior to meeting me trying to get out of her hometown and away from them so she could experience life on her own terms. She succeeded by marrying some guy at 18 and moving away, so when I met her, she had already been divorced once. Naturally, I heard a lot about all of that when we were getting to know each other, and it didn't bother me. Anyway, at this point, she's pregnant by me for a 2nd time, and in an effort to reconnect with her family whom she deeply cares for, she suggested we get married in an attempt to begin repairing the relationship between her and her parents as they were less than enthusiastic about being the grandparents to bastards. I loved her, thought it would make her happy, and figured what the hell I'm going to stay with this woman for the rest of my days anyway, so why not. I also liked the idea of giving my kids the opportunity to have a relationship with both sets of their grandparents. What happened next caused me to share some less than savory feelings I was having. About 30 weeks into the second pregnancy, we found out she was pregnant with not one but 2 babies. I didn't know how to act. Tried to play it cool, but couldn't, and in a heated discussion/argument, whatever the hell you want to call it, I made it known that I had wished we had abortions. For both my son, who was already there, and now since she was pregnant with 2 more. I suspect that was the seed for most of, if not all, of our future problems we've had between each other at this point because while she isn't religious, she doesn't believe abortions are morally right. I was a kid myself at the time and had no idea how great being the father of my boys would be. Just to pile on to the shit show, just before my twin boys were born, I had gotten a job doing Comercial hvac contol installation in an attempt to find a career to support my growing family. 6 months into the job, I fell off a ladder and broke my wrist in at least 3 spots in a way that required surgery. Unfortunately, as a result of the incident and also the fact that her and I liked to indulge in the electric lettuce, I was fired before I hit the ground and just didn't know it yet. So when they were born I had a broken fuckin wrist and a pissant dead end job at another sub shop because I needed to work but still had to recover from surgery. As you can imagine, this put a wildly enormous strain on us in more ways than one. Since I was no longer making the kind of money we were used to we had to move from the nice home in the nice part of town we were in to the shit apartment in the shit part of town we lived in when most of the rest of our issues happened. Fast forward another 8 months or so, we are the parents of now 3 boys, and I get her pregnant again. I know how it sounds, but life has a funny way of going sometimes. This time after the fact, I got a vasectomy to take any more opportunity to get pregnant out of the equation. Anyway, this is where I'm sure the relationship between us really started to sour because we had 2 really bad fights on 2 separate occasions where I was both punched and slapped in the face for saying things like I wished she had aborted our kids and calling her a fat cunt for no other reason than to inflict the most damage possible during the heated arguments. Unfortunately, during both of these arguments, she was pregnant with my youngest son, and in the heat of the arguments, when tensions were highest and I had been both slapped and punched, I slapped back exactly once and pushed her exactly once. These 2 incidents happened separately from each other. The push is where I'm sure her love died and to be fair rightfully so. Anyway, ultimately, we ended up moving to her hometown after my 4th and final son was born against my wishes to get closer to her family that she had been repairing her relationship with because my parents weren't as particularly involved as I thought they were going to be and it was going to be much easier to find a cheaper better home for us to live in. We end up finding a place and soldier on for the kids' sake. I wound up with a job that I still have to this day that's turning out to be a decent career and just tried to be a better provider, father, and husband every day. We lived in that home for a year with me as the sole provider, so she could just focus on being a mother since it isn't exactly easy to find child care for 4 children under 5. After that year, we found another home about 15 minutes west as we weren't in love with the previous one. 3 of the boys got to be old enough to start doing schooling, so she started to look for a job she could do in order to bring in a little extra fun money to use to splurge on ourselves and the boysas a lot of my income went towards things like bills and food. In that time, I began to get promotions at my jobs, allowing me to make more money to better provide for my family. She eventually found an overnight job at a warehouse that paid well enough to accomplish what we were trying to accomplish. For the first time in about 2 and a half years, I was starting to feel much better about our financial situation. It made me much happier overall to the point where I didn't feel so exhausted after work that I was pitching in much more at home and doing more of the lovey things I used to do with my wife. Then, about 3 months into her job on a weekend on a day/night, we were both off, and I discovered it. She had gotten that job, and for at least a month, she had been cheating on me with one of her coworkers. A couple of times without a condom. I was devastated, I'm still broken about it. She had left her phone on the counter with the screen on and the text thread with the guy open. I smoked an entire pack of cigarettes that night, not knowing what to do. I felt a mixture of numbness and a stabbing pain in my heart. I don't remember much of what she said about it. Somehow, that night, after a long while, I was able to get to bed because I had to work the next day. The next day first thing I called my boss and filled him in on what was going on. Oh, and I forgot to mention that was the Thursday of the worst week of my life so far. Earlier in the week, my wife had taken my car out because she didn't have one at the time. I get a call while I'm at work from her saying she's been in a car accident while on the way home from a job interview because she was planning on leaving the warehouse job under some false pretenses. Nothing like fucking your married co worker while being married yourself to make an awkward work place am I right? Anyway, my car wasn't totaled, but it wasn't in great shape, and the accident turned out to be my wife's fault, so there was zero insurance money to be had. Instead of getting mad at her, I just shrugged it off, made sure she was okay, and decided that in order to try and fix it, I would just take on an extra day at work. At the time, I worked Monday to Friday, so I picked up Saturday and would have picked up Sunday, too, if it wasn't for the fact that it is the only day of the week my company doesn't operate. That was Monday of that week. On Wednesday, my phone broke, so I was forced to get a new one because my being able to work depends on me having a working phone. The next day, Thursday, was when I found out she had been cheating. So yeah, it was the worst week of my life so far. I spent that weekend and the next at my parents' house an hour and a half away to try and gain some of my footing back and blow off some steam with my friends because I no longer lived near them. I think that's the most I've cried in my adult life. I wound up going back to see my boys. I have stayed because I feel trapped. I'm scared I'll end up losing a large portion of my income to her if we end up in a custody battle over the boys. Mostly impart of more recent events. I haven't been the same since I found out she cheated. I've been sad, wildly sad, depressed even, paranoid, and anxious as all hell. Needless not say, not my best self. Now, to pile on I find myself in a precarious position with cps because one of my twin 5 year Olds decided to go off screaming about not liking some TV show one of his brothers picked to watch. In the heat of the moment I gave him an open hand pop on the mouth to sort of bring him back to reality and left a pinky nail sized mark on his cheek. Which prompted a call from the school to cps when he went to school and was asked about it so he told them the truth and his mother backed him up. I find myself forced out of the home I pay for where the people i love most live because I let the stress of everything going on get to me like an idiot and acted out of anger. That has led their mother whom I was trying to forgive for the kids sake to bring up everything from 3 years ago again and now she's treating me like the bad guy again, which I guess I am. It's been a few weeks now that I've been out of my home now out of what could be a grand total of 6 months so long as I jump through the hoops before me. I fully plan on taking advantage of the parenting classes and councling I've been told will be provided so I can work on being a better father to my kids and a less angry person overall. But only being able to see my kids through FaceTime hurts and the way my wife has been treating me makes me think it might just be better for everyone if we just split in order avoid potential set backs due to our history. I don't know if it would be the right decision, but I do know I want to be the best father I can be for my boys. Anyway, that's my rant/story/ whatever. Thanks for reading if you made it this far I know it was long

Blaze 3: Demonic Arc 5: Immortal Sins⁷
Last time. FATHER made plans with the Anti-Sapiens. He wanted to gather the Anti-Sapiens in one spot. FATHER would force jim to create an invention for Jillian which would make her fight her the others. Team Blaze were trying to get the others together. Sidney's group fought Takei and questioned was he an Anti-Sapien. The Anti-Sapiens have finally made it to Togyu Manji. FATHER was shown with a new Anti-Sapien. What will happen now? FATHER" I'm glad that you are here." Rampage" Pleasure doing business with you." FATHER" We are nearly there." Rampage" I sense some good spirit energy. Let me make a quick stop." FATHER" Make it quick." Rampage challenges some people.
Rampage" Who is next?" Geo appears and says" I guess I am now." Rampage thinks" That spirit energy. He's one of the strong ones. I can see it in his eyes." Geo struggles to keep up with his strikes. Geo" He's strong. Too strong. He surpassed my hand to hand. He's not ordinary(thoughts)."fight over. They finally make it to the others. Rampage" So these are the other Anti-Sapiens." FATHER begins to laugh. FATHER" It's about damn time. We are finally one. We will make the world suffer. Feel our wrath." Everyone laughs as well. Team Blaze are shown. Corroshi" Eyashi. What brings you guys here?"
Eyashi" We have actually discovered something. We've got word that the Anti-Sapiens are joining up. I believe it is going to be here." Corroshi" Why do you think that?" Fasha" Togyu Manji is a very large area. They probably want to takeover here. And besides, there's a lot of incidents that occur here anyways." Corroshi" Nice response." Zushi" We needed to round up everyone and warn them. We need everyone here. We need your help." Corroshi" You can count on me." Sez" Hey Corroshi?" Corroshi turns around and says" Do I know you?" Sez" It's me Sez. From the tournament." Corroshi" Oh yeah. I remember you not. You are the one who tried to cheat." Sez" That's me." Corroshi" So why did you come back?"
Sez" I heard you moved and wanted to know if you let you join your team?" Corroshi" Well of course you can. Welcome aboard!" Sez" Aw thanks." Geo and the others aren't there yet. Now everyone is together. Rischardo" Since we're up against Anti-Sapiens, I want everybody to know this. If any of you see Anti-Sapiens named Ira and Danly Indies, there my kids and I'll deal with them. Ira has red hair and Danly has orange hair." Everyone is training with each other. Julmbo" Hey Fasha." Fasha" Yes." Julmbo" Let me see your blade." She does. Julmbo" I see. There is something I need to teach you. Reincarnation." Fasha" Reincarnation?" Julmbo" It's the ability to fix broken Extension Blades."
He breaks his blade. Julmbo" Reincarnation!" The blade has fixed itself. Fasha" Wow that's going to take some time." Julmbo" Nonsense. With your skills you'll master it in no time." He continues to train Fasha. MaXx, Haden, and Sid are lifting weights. MaXx and Haden get into an altercation. MaXx's eyes turn black. MaXx" I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!!" MaXx' Dark Seal interrupts. He raises his blade towards Haden. Eyashi uses his speed and gets in between(has his hands out separating them)them and says" Brothers shouldn't fight! MaXx don't let darkness consume you." He snaps out of it. MaXx" You're right." Thank you." His eyes return. Keira Saja goes towards Sid and says" I want to be just like you, Fasha, Phil, and the others."
Sid" What do you mean Keira?" Keira" I wish I had powers so I could protect you guys and fight alongside you. If CJ could have power behind I could. I wanted to know if you would train me?" Sid" Ah yeah. Sure. First I need you to hit my fists." She does. Sid" Good but harder. " Phil and Fasha laughs(good laughs). Keira continues to work on her strikes. Cumi name change. Was supposed to sound like cute. New name. Cuimi(kwee-me). Cuemi(q-me). Cuimi(c-oo-me). New name is Cuemi. Cuemi has a vision. Cuemi" Wait! There are these people and there are shredded. We have to save them." Corroshi" Where are they?" They are headed out.
People are on the ground, all cut up. Domay" Who could have done this." Ishani" I think I am going to be sick." She almost throws up. They hear a knife sound cutting together. They go check it out. There's a man standing on dead bodies with his back turn. He turns around and has knives in his hands. Geo" It's him!" He charges and attacks. Eyon" You know this guy?" Geo" This guy was challenging people and he beat me. Hand to hand combat. He is not ordinary. I knew it was slomething about the guy." Rampage" Right you are." He shows off his Anti-Sapien symbol on the left shoulder. Eyashi" He's an Anti-Sapien?" Rampage" Terrified yet? You will be." He strains(screams)his body and shoots off quills(porcupine) towards the others.
People are screaming watch out. Wiggy puts her hair on(wig). The wig has a mind of its own. The wig attaches itself to the scalp. Long hair. The wig can walk Haira(Wiggy) around. Resembles Dr. Octopus. His tentacles are like her hair. The wig is Saiivo. Wig" It's about time you are using me. You must be in a bad situation." Wiggy" I don't need you to be talking. Just shut it." Wig" Whatever you say." Phil hears something. He sees something gooey. He begins to smirk. Phil" Genesis. I guess you're back. Well come on out." Wiggy appears and says" Expecting someone." As Phil gets closer, her hair grabs him from below. Phil" She did that with hair. She's pretty crafty." Her hair becomes gooey and she attacks Phil. Phil" She is an Anti-Sapien." Wiggy" right you are.
As Phil attacks Wiggy, his body goes through her. Phil" What are you? Your hair has to be made with....." Wiggy" That's right. Saiivo." Phil" I knew it." Genesis appears from the ground. Genesis" I was getting a little bored fighting you and all so it's time for a switch. I'll fight you guys." He goes after Sid, Fasha, and Eyashi. He multiplies himself and says" This ought to do it." Bugs are in the area. Strider" It's him!" The other Anti-Sapiens have arrived. Draum sees Wiggy's uniform. Draum" Hey hair lady?" Eyashi" Really? Hair lady." Draum" Shut up will ya. That uniform. You're with the Hydro Corps. What ties do you have with them? I used to be a member." Wiggy" As if I'd tell you." Draum" Figures." Bugs come from his hands(cut off off hand). Rischardo turns around Tijiri and punches him.
Rischardo" Hey there. We never finished our fight." Tijiri" Right you are." They fight. Tijiri" By the way I'm Black Hawk or Tijiri Akaru." Rischardo" (big grin)And I'm Rischardo Inies. The Demonic King. Does that intimidate you?" Tijiri" Not in the least. This will be great." Rischardo" Do you know any Anti-Sapiens named, Ira and Danly Inies? They are my kids." Tijiri" Never heard of them before." Jillian" There are all of these evil duers. Hahaha. Enough for me. Prepare. You'll be parrish." Sid" This feels weird for us to fight." Fasha" Yes it does." Location: Outside Eyashi's house. Genesis clones himself. Genesis" Now there's plenty of me to go around." Julmbo" Hey Takei! Over here!" Massk" You better not disappoint me this time." Julmbo" I won't." Julmbo and Tinn vs Massk. This Time he has help.
Strider and Spike vs Buzz. Spike uses earth boulders and traps him however, he escapes. He appears him and attacks. Strider does some combo attacks but his body keeps becomes bugs. Buzz's hand(cut off) becomes made of bugs. He claps his hands together and and his bugs get bigger. Spike hits it but it hurts his hand. Spike" What's that thing made of! It nearly broke my hand." Buzz chuckles. Strider launches a fireball but it is not phase it. Strider" What kind of a bug is that?" It spits out something. The attack hard just like it's body. Buzz" I know you can do better than that. With the 2 of you, you can do it." Spike" Strider!" Strider" What do you want?" Spike" When we fought him last time, we were able to get the upper hand because we were together and had him frozen."
Strider" I know what you mean. Hey julmbo and Tinn! We need you guys help!" Julmbo" We're in the middle of a fight." Tinn" Well it does seem like it's important." Julmbo" Fine we on the way." Ending. Julmbo manages to freeze Buzz" Massk tries to stop it but Tinn hold him off. Strider delivers a fiery uppercut and he breaks. Strider" It's over." The others are happy. Suddenly, a sworn of bugs appears and Buzz has returned. Body made of bugs. Mouth has a burnt spot. Buzz" It's going to take a lot longer than that to put me down." Julmbo tries to freeze him again but he goes through it. Julmbo turns his attention to Massk. This time he seems impossible to take out. Ending. Buzz chokes both of them. Strider" There doesn't seem like a way out of this one." Massk takes a look around him. He begins to snap.
Massk" No. Not this place." Strider and Spike look at each other. He is not fighting. Spike" His body is visible again(no bugs). This is our chance." Strider" Right!" Spike uses earth materials and holds his arms. Strider" Goodbye Jakob!" He charges and punches him with a fiery fist. He hits him in his guts. He is dead officially. Wiggy" My brother is dead. Should have saw it coming. He always had issues." Phil" That guy is your brother?" Wiggy" Yes." Wig" You don't stand a chance kid." Phil" Who's that? " Wiggy" It's just my wig." Phil" Wig!" The wig forms a hand and waves. Wig" Hey there." Phil" Wow that's impressive." Wiggy shoots a dark attack on Phil. He eats it away. Wiggy" Impossible! He ate the attack!" Phil" I forgot to mention that I have a Saiivo as well." Wiggy" Preposterous! Another Saiivo user." Phil" That's right."
Wiggy's story with her brothers and her wig is shown. Many years ago. Haira(hair-ah) and Jakob always wanted a pet when they were little but didn't have enough money. Eventually they would get lucky to have enough money. The 1st pet was a dog. The dog would bite Jakob and he snapped the dogs neck. Jakob was always rough with toys. Jakob didn't know how to get along with others. Prefered to play by himself. When their brother was born, Jakob would hold him incorrectly. Wodu Akali. Their mother would correct him. One day he ended up strangling Wodu. Haira had to put an end to it. Their mother and father saw that Jakob was a threat. He needs to go. His parents are shown crawling away and begging for help. He tries to kill them and does. Jakob is then locked up in a special prison.
Jakob is a psychopath and manages to kill the guards(years lateadult). Bugs would appear from their corps. FATHER'S voice would be heard , telling him to touch the bugs. He does. Bugs begins to course through his veins. He'd then escapes. His powers then grew at a phenomenal rate. He would meet Heather who was the love of his life. What Jakob did not bring up, was that Heather had mental issues and was unstabled. Just like him. Regardless of her issues, he ignored it and treated her like a regular person. Perfect for each other. People had there eyes on her and wanted her dead. She was causing trouble. Heather was set up and killed. Burned at her home. Jakob goes in to save her but his mouth gut burned but. He didn't save her. Afterwards, he'd see another person who looked exactly like his Heather. Harper. While Jakob was locked up, Haira would get different pets. However they ran away.
FATHER's voice is heard. She is an Anti-Sapiens. She wanted to know if she is truly immortal. FATHER told her about what the Spirit World did. She jumped off a steep cliff. When she opened her eyes, she woke up in bed(when an immortal jumps off a cliff, they can't die/even the Royal Family or just the God and Goddess). She had survived. FATHER tells her about a pet that will be very useful to her. She sees hair but it begins to move. It took her awhile to catch it but finally does. It talks and is Saiivo. The wig explains the hair to her. The Wig crawls on her head and attaches itself to her scalp. From that day on, she can use the Wig to do what she wants. Just like a pet. Story over.
Phil" Wo. What a story." Wiggy's hair stretches and grab Phil with multiple hands(hair). Phil is being held up by the hair while Wiggy attacks. Wiggy uses hand signs. Multiple hair strings appears. Phil uses fireball but the Wig eats it. Wig" Um. Tasty!" Phil" She ate it!?" Phil uses earth style but the same thing happens. Phil" Eat this!" He uses Tinsibugadai. Wig detaches itself from Wiggy and jumps up. Wiggy was almost cut up. Wiggy" That was close!p
Arc Notes- Spirit Cuffs. Wind Slice Attack. Sid spit lightning attack works with fire (combine together) FATHER. Light Power heal chair. Rade plant lady. Geo likes to eat but Yolmmo eats more. Rade uses Genesis to get information without having to leave his spot. He tells to Eyashi Arc 6. Rade apple. Draum takes Hydro Corps with Justice Drivers. Keina Kiyoshi 7. Last time on opening Arc 6. Arc 7 lots of demons. Sez Unemori gadget style. Sakura Hurata Arc 5. Korin Kore. 11th grade. Soothsayer short witch attire. Go to school together. Gru boxing style. Sid, Phil and Fasha back to back. Nara Haseku. Frogg Kikio 4. How to do Fire Morph. Archer. Wind Swallow. Shadow Spea Sabitist Lemaru pike. Blaze rich. Call me Darkness. Tijiri Akaru. Ball shape. Anti-Sapien Hydro Corps. Reincarnation. Massk story. Talk about mask. Body weapon/ absorb/keep power. Absorb blades. Sid and Phil extend fists before the fight. Sidney lots of Anti-Sapiens appearing frequently. Jim dies but will be blame on Team Blaze. Lady Lightning puts Haden to sleep. To spark or not to spark. Jakob Akali. Draum stronger than the demons. Danly I am a demon. Ignoramus. Genesis. Anti-Sapiens need to be stopped. Sydney Fire Morph. Color of mist. Keira Umo 12th grade. Arrows shoot Tijiri. Mountain. Kill guards. Blade Eater. Draum he used a kikio. Geronimo. Sakura Justice Drivers. Anti-Sapien animal powers.
Sidney's group. Tiger(female)=Donta. Bear=Yoshatora(fat). Gorilla=Jasin(stuck in form/good archer).
Mind Controller- Dwells into the person's mind and uses their memories against them. Making the mind attack it's owner.
Team Earth: Corroshi Setse(all styles/fire fav)(master), Geo Kazy(Dragon style/Jeet Kune Do), Eyon Yoshi(Lightning/fire), Yolmmo Usay(wateice) Domay Usay(wind), Korr Yoshi, Kunesuke Atara(glasses/reads/black/lady's man), Su Lin(Eyon's girlfriend/Chinese/not black), Ishani Sharma(Indian skin/not black/turban/Yolmmo's)
Hydro Corps: Sodum Hydro(leader), Coracoona/Charzie Anderson(not black), Dornymious(door-nee-me-us)Ryeno or Rhyno(Rhino/not black/charges), Shune Tuche(to-shay/special suit and mask/great hunter)
Areas- Tohoku Japan(setting/West Japan), Togyu Manji(Sid's home), Conithio Town, Kurai (dark) Haitsu(heights), Renyu Haito, Shiawasena Michi(happy road), Hausada, Heteritoke Town, Kibakoru(near a bakery), Ryusoka (ree-u-so-kah)Tofa,(small town), Zuloko Ikiki(large area), Uketa(oo-kee-tah) Sada(near a graveyard area), Sushun(Soul Snatcher's headquarters), Osaka Japan(western Japan)(Team Earth's original home), Kanta Japan(eastern Japan), Burakkubēsu(means black base)/(Black Widow's hideout),
Greater Demons-Balaam and Dracula
Notes-Mirror asylum. Plache appears arc 6. Rade is a scientist. Wants Kikia to give up her organization. He uses a dark gass it turns people into demons. Erika, Keira Umo, Eyashi, Zushi, and others become demons put into a facility. Must find antidote. Rade has all the demons power Who died. Haden arm becomes demon like but hasn't turned yet. Kikia will stick him with a syringe. Demon form wears off. Arc 6. Haden and MaXx can't win. demon souls. Airball- can be small or large/chargeable. Eyashi- Wind of the Dragon Punch. Charge fist thpen strike the enemy/enemies. Late effect. Final blow will feel like a combination of all the punches in one. Maybe Phil. Dead Beat- idea demon/creature. Strider punches mountain/Gru move mountain. Camme punches Sid untie hair. Huff and puff(wind style).
Lightning Beam (Death Beam). Eyashi got 3 main bosses to like him. Absorb moves/spirt energy. Thunder Strike/plow. Rischardo Underworld fighting scene. Dragon Breath. Heat Vision. Hot as Hell move. Double jump. Liba Tezu. Kiko glasses. We're twins..cousins Fasha. That arm. You're a Soul Killer. You have the red flpower. It's you. Punch/ uppercut Thunder Rider. MaXx grabs it and throws it back. Saundra asks for Sid's name. She tells Ryu. He appears and sees Sid.
Charging fist Sid and Phil. Regular male student too many female characters. Genesis. Rade uses rings to cuff bodyl/Freak Ring Circus/Spirit Ring Cuff. Dragon Flare origin during Bosch's story. Burning Impalememet Sid. Surfing Ice Blade works with other elements. Sid used first with Reaper Sajettus then Fasha with Rudiaslaudia and Sakura used. 1st Lt Alex Mohoto. The Hydro Corps. Eyon vs Tairon was controlled. Fēng's blade Dragon Heart. Dark Matter. Haden purple lightning. When Danly dies, Rischardo will be shown/ Flashbacks shown/will say his son's name. Velencya bird. Corri Howbori. Sid lightning style against Blaze. Lightning Slash. Spirit energy. Rischardo trains Sid. Underwater. Keira says I want to be like you sid train her. Destruction/Destructional Saucer(disk) Domay. Hall of the Gods. Gods on left and Goddesses on right. Gods of Time. Rischardo warns his Greater Demons. Rischardo runs into them later Arc last straw. Camme can't fly. Lightning and wind Morph speed. Mandi glasses Blaze IV likes Spike in Blaze 3.
Ra-Ibo and Kungaru power greater than God of Spirit world and demonic king

It's hard to say what exactly separates the seedy underbelly of Seattle from the middle and upper-class neighborhoods. There are just as many drones flying overhead and crawling underfoot, just as many signs in meatspace and augmented reality advertising all manner of good times, just as many colorful astral sights to see for the magically active folk who can see them. The differences are subtle, but still noticeable if you know how to look.
Perhaps it's the way people look at you as though they're either planning to mug you or defend themselves in case you feel like mugging them. Perhaps it's the abundance of flickering lights and generally janky infrastructure all around, giving many things the look of being not entirely up to code or legally constructed. Perhaps it's the feeling that you're out from under the constant watch of the powers that be, for better and for worse.
People who know the shadows know that anything and anyone can be found there, for the right price and after some hard looking. Need a street-doc to dig a Ruger Super Warhawk bullet out of your shoulder off the books? Need a decker to leak your cheating ex's naughty pictures all over the local grid? Need a street-mage to skip the drugs and cast a spell directly stimulating the pleasure center of your brain? Need an armored ork with a shotgun to kick in a door somewhere and pump the guy who stole your girlfriend full of buckshot? You can find all those things and more on the streets, chummer, if you know where and how to look, and if you can pay the fee that might not always be a simple nuyen transaction.
As your path begins turning you down the darker streets, and into the places where concerned upper-class parents warn their dopey college kids to stay far away from, the locals can all tell you're not from around here. A rat shaman takes a peek at your aura and isn't all that impressed, a decker scans your devices and decides your comlink isn't worth the bother of hacking, an armored ork with a shotgun sizes you up and goes back to his monster-sized burger at the street kitchen, deciding you're as much a threat to him as an itchy pair of underwear. They know at a glance you're not from around here, but most simply don't care. It's hardly a rare occurrence that someone from "out of town" wanders in; most are simply looking for someplace else, in which case they simply wander back out again, looking for business or pleasure, in which case they find it and move on when their errand is finished, or looking for trouble, in which case they end up shot, stabbed, burned, bruised, drained of astral lifeforce, or with a thin stream of blue smoke coming from their ear where a bricked piece of cranial cyberware once resided. Sometimes all at once, and sometimes with even more...creative ends.
But you're on a mission, you're looking for the next phase of your life. Any long-time denizen of the shadows will tell you that there comes a time in all their lives when they have to pack up the past, store it all away in the attic where their memories go, and start fresh with a clean slate and hopefully some lessons learned. That's what's got you in the sketchy side of town this evening. The only question left is who you are now.
Are you an addict whose money ran dry and who's starting to spiral into darker vices? A sprawl ganger who wants to prove himself and start climbing up the food chain? A mage looking for a place to begin practicing the forbidden sides of magic? A newbie hacker who dug too deep one day and now needs stronger protection than the cheap firewall program on her deck and the taser under her pillow? The choice is yours where you start, and the choice is yours where you go from here. But you can always be sure of one thing....
The shadows can be the best or the worst thing to happen to you, but one way or another, it's going to be one hell of a ride.
[...]
Hi there! Thanks for reading :D
If anyone here is familiar with the Shadowrun world or has any interest in the hints I've given about it, then this story is for you. You don't need to already be familiar with Shadowrun to take part, I'll happily answer whatever questions I can for anyone who doesn't already know them but has an interest.
I'd like to do a story about someone not from the shadows having/wanting to uproot their former life and transition into the life offered by the sketchy criminal underworld. Ideally, I'd like it to be long-term since there's rarely a dull day in the life of someone from the shadows and there are all kinds of interesting stories to weave from that basic thread. I'm a big fan of "found family" and "honor among thieves" vibes, maybe we could do something with that?
If anyone is curious, I'm male, 25 years of age, and from the EST time zone. I've been roleplaying for about half my life and playing Shadowrun for 6 or 7 years, so while I'm not a grandmaster of either, I think I know enough about both to create an awesome story with someone who wants to work with me. I'd be happy to send a writing sample to anyone who wants to verify that for themselves.
I want my partner to be 18+ since there can be some dark things that happen in the shadows, and I'd like my partner to be at least semi-literate, but otherwise, I'm more or less open to anyone! Come one come all; if you're interested in this prompt, then I'm interested in talking more with you about it. I can't address every detail or question someone might have in this post, so if you have any questions or comments, PM me here and I'll be glad to answer them.
I hope to hear from you soon! :D. And remember:
Watch your back, shoot straight, conserve ammo, and never...
...EVER...
make a deal with a dragon.

I’m struggling so hard accepting my weight gain. I was always rather slim in my teen and early adult years (2-6 fluctuating). I am now buying 10/12 and barely fitting. I know I’m fat now. I’ve gained so much weight but I still see myself as skinny?? Like until I look at pictures I guess. But when I’m just existing, I don’t feel fat!! It’s bothering me so much because I know I am. My measurements tell me I am. The pictures tell me I am. Family and friends tell me I am. I don’t even think I’m a size 10-12? According to google a 41 inch waist is a women’s size 20-22… It just sucks I keep forgetting I’m fucking fat until I see myself in a picture or try on a pair 16 jeans that are too tight. I’ll plan a cute outfit in my head but go to execute and it’s awful. I’ll be ordering food and get a weird look and remember I’m fat now and get insecure. I know being fat isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I am very unhealthy though. It’s a hard lifestyle to get used to when I still feel slim when I’m just existing alone. I want to be slim again. I’m so sick of people telling me I’m fat and giving me awful looks. I feel like I’m in delusion when I wanna wear something tight or go out because I forget I’m so overweight now.

I need help and support with the KaiseOptifast weight loss plan I'm following. We've been fasting for a month as a group of 20 or more people. We eat six meal replacements every day, but I'm still hungry and dizzy. I tried to stick to the plan at first and drank black coffee to help, but it wasn't enough. For extra fuel when my stomach starts to growl, I've been eating a few snacks. This led to having meat and vegetables for one meal a day. The weight loss is still going on, and I've lost 20 pounds so far.Everyone in the groups tells me "it's getting easier," and they seem to be able to stick to the plan with just food replacements. On the Optifast website, it says to eat two cups of veggies during the weight loss and fasting phase, but Kaiser doesn't do this. They are very strict about cheating and say that we could get gastritis if we do it. It seems like I've been "cheating" the whole time, but I haven't had any stomach trouble. We slowly move on to food in week 17, but I'm already doing it. It makes me feel bad, but it helps me. Have you been through this program? If so, what did you think? Or do you think I should change the program?

Hello People! In case you're someone who is planning to move to Pune and want to understand what the expenses are like, I would like to share it with you all. I live with three other friends in a rented appartment in Hinjawadi Phase-2.
Rent - INR 5k - The total rent is 20k, for an unfurnished 2BHK flat and it is divided among 4 people. This is the lowest possible rent in this area (Pls don't ask me how).
Food - INR - 7k - Okay so this is the trickiest part. I pay for a tiffin service and it costs me INR 60 per day. This is for one time (lunch). We cook in the evening, but purchase chapatis/bhakhris which costs us INR 7 per chapati and 20 per Bhakhri. Other than that, I eat in the office's canteen (snacks and breakfast) where the average cost of food is 40 (Pohe, Dosa, Misal Paav, etc). We also go to eat out once a week (on weekends) and per person cost is INR 250. This cost also includes whatever we pay for the groceries.
Transport - INR 190 - Yes, that is correct. The catch is, I don't have a vehicle here and I stay 2kms away from the office. The ticket cost of PMPL (Public Bus here) from my nearest stop to office's stop is just Rs 5, so the daily cost is just INR 10 and I go to office daily. Sometimes I just walk home. Sometimes I just get the lift from a colleague. I just have to walk every day for around 3kms (home to bus stop, bus stop to office and vice-versa).
I have a very boring life style haha! I do spend money on other activities like box cricket with colleagues, upskilling (online courses), investments, sending money to hometown, etc. but I have not considered those costs in the calculation. I believe everything other than the above mentioned expenses is optional or a personal choice.
These numbers are kind of accurate because I use an app and add daily expenses to it.
I hope this gives you a rough idea. Feel free to ask me anything about the expenses.

Embarking on my weight loss journey was a pivotal moment, one that I marked on my 40th birthday. Surrounded by friends and family, as I blew out the candles, a sense of discontent gnawed at me. Despite my efforts to lead a healthy life, the pounds had stealthily piled on over the years. Determined to find a solution, I set out to discover the ultimate lose weight meal plan tailored for women like me, especially those navigating the challenges of being over 40.
​
Understanding why weight loss is more challenging for women, particularly as we age, became a crucial part of my quest. Hormonal fluctuations, particularly during menopause, and the natural decline in muscle mass as we grow older are significant factors. Yet, armed with the right knowledge, I knew that achieving weight loss, even during perimenopause, was within reach.
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Revamping my nutrition was the cornerstone of my strategy. I focused on crafting a meal plan rich in whole, nutrient-dense foods—fresh fruits, vegetables, lean proteins, and healthy fats formed the basis of my diet. Bid farewell to processed foods, sugary snacks, and refined carbs; they had no place in my new lifestyle.
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Meal planning became my secret weapon, aiding in portion control and curbing mindless eating. Each week, I meticulously planned my meals and snacks, aligning them with my schedule and preferences. This not only kept me on track with my nutritional goals but also saved time and money by averting impulse purchases and last-minute takeout orders.
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Mindful eating became a practice I embraced wholeheartedly. Tuning into my body's hunger and fullness cues allowed me to savor each bite, fostering a healthier relationship with food.
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Of course, exercise was another crucial component of my journey. I incorporated a variety of activities—cardio, strength training, and flexibility exercises—to promote overall well-being. Walking, swimming, yoga, and weightlifting became staples in my routine, offering diverse benefits while keeping workouts enjoyable.
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As I adhered to my tailored meal plan and lifestyle changes, the results were undeniable. Not only did I shed pounds, but I also experienced increased energy levels, better sleep, and a newfound confidence. Clothes that once felt snug now draped comfortably, a tangible testament to my progress.
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Reflecting on my journey, I realized that there's no universal formula for weight loss. It's about finding what works for you, listening to your body, and practicing patience along the way. With dedication, consistency, and a positive mindset, achieving weight loss goals—even for women over 40—is entirely achievable.
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So, if you're ready to embark on your own journey towards a healthier you, consider crafting a personalized lose weight meal plan tailored for women over 40. Remember to prioritize whole, nutritious foods, embrace mindful eating, stay active, and above all, be kind to yourself throughout the process. You deserve to feel your best at every stage of life, and with the right plan in place, you absolutely can.
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If you're looking for an extra boost on your weight loss journey, I highly recommend giving LivPure a try—it truly made a difference for me.

The 29th of May 2024 in OPAP Arena (colloquially Hagia Sophia Stadium), the 2023-24 Olympiacos squad entered the club's history by winning the Conference League and becoming the first Greek club to add a European trophy in its collection at senior level (after doing the same at Youth Level a few weeks ago)!
Brief history lesson for the class:
Olympiacos is historically the emperor of Greek football. 47 league titles vs 41 for every other team combined speaks for itself. But European glory has always been the club's white whale, the goal that was never scored, the one thing missing from the club's myth. There are many reasons for this oddity:

• a mentality that "the 1st is everything and the rest are nothing" which led to trophy hunting always being prioritized over deep European runs.
• a team which usually played without much focus or investment in defense (Giovanni and Rivaldo up front, Anatolakis CB is a great example) because its main objective was to break down park-the-bus Greek defenses.
• the club never had the stars align in Europe (which is also needed if you aren't a big league club).

Europe was the only lifeline of Olympiacos' enemies in years of red and white domestic rule: they had memorable moments from Europe that Olympiacos didn't. They also used it as an argument that Olympiacos' local dominance is based on corruption and in Europe, where there is real refereeing etc., the true strength of the club shows.
Zooming in the last years:
Marinakis bought the club in 2010 and immediately achieved domestic domination. He brought back Ernesto Valverde, whose football philosophy affects Olympiacos until today, and the club stated regulary getting 9 and 10 points in CL until 2016. A combination of reasons led to a decline of quality and 2 lost titles until Pedro Martins put the team back in a order.
Εuropean success kept eluding though: despite some great wins, there was always a circumstance putting an end to the European journey - luck, Marinakis firing the coach for ego reasons (Jardim, Bento), GK blunders, covid changing the season, or simply a weaker team at the given moment.
In 2022-23 Olympiacos had a horrible season and Marinakis changed everything in the summer: you can read in details my post from August here.
Since then:
Did you read it? Good. Now throw all the planning and philosophy which was in theory put in place in August out of the window.
It didn't work. Diego Martinez improved the team and quality was added in several positions in attack and the wings, but the defense was vulnerable, the midfield was understaffed, and it went down the drain in November: the defensive performances against Greek minnows at home (despite wins) and the draw against Backa Topola (!) was the warning bell, and the hammer fell against PAOK at home (2-4) and Freiburg away (5-0). These results are not acceptable for Olympiacos under any circumstance, especially heavy defeats from other Greek clubs, and in early December, Martinez was fired with Olympiacos finishing 3rd in an EL Group with Freiburg, West Ham and Backa Topola with 7 points but having only 1 point in 3 Greek derbies.
But it gets worse: Marinakis hired Portuguese journeyman Carlos Carvalhal. He "fixed" the defense by positioning the players to sit back which led to not scoring against Lamia, Atromitos and Panathinaikos (twice), the players disliked him (Podence was visibly not even putting an effort) and the season looked lost, with PAOK having a 9 points lead in early February, the team out of the Cup to Panathinaikos and unable to win any Greek derby, much less think of Europe where Ferencvaros was waiting. Carvalhal was fired 1 week before the 1st leg match against Ferencvaros.
Marinakis is impulsive, arrogant and confrontational, and these traits led to the demise of the red and white stranglehold on domestic titles. But he is also very stubborn and really, really hates losing.
Changing 80% of the team didn't work? Let's do it again then in January!
Out go:
https://preview.redd.it/t7iqi675yk3d1.png?width=1392&format=png&auto=webp&s=89367a037749a8dae6197aa89546c43a4b684c0e
In go:
https://preview.redd.it/k1cv8vy7yk3d1.png?width=1401&format=png&auto=webp&s=688cef9c3c7a8a32ed1af51e68cc6e259541bbbc
And this time...jack-pot!
These transfers transformed Olympiacos for the best. Carmo is a 10 times better CB than Freire and Porozo combined. Chiquinho and Horta are quality, modern midfielders which complement the wonderful Hezze who was fighting alone for months next to unprofessional Mady Camara, and give a role to veteran Iborra in a midfield of 3. Martins gave much needed depth in the wings that Solbakken and Biel had failed to do. Abbey gave depth to the CB position. Navarro was a flop but you can't have it all.
The key to turning a wasted season to a glorious one, the missing piece of the puzzle, was the 3rd coach of the year: Jose Luis Mendilibar.
The fans were furious with Marinakis, his entourage, and the players, and there was no enthusiasm when Mendilibar arrived: his EL trophy was treated as a fluke, like Di Matteo's CL because "Sevilla can win EL without a coach". His work at Eibar was disregarded as "it's a small club, what does he know about having to win every week". His debut was to be against Ferencvaros....
Here. We. Go!
1st minute of the match, Olympiacos defense is sleeping as usually and the Hungarians score. The new coach is destined to fail already, just like that. But VAR to the rescue: hairline offside! The match is balanced, but Olympiacos with the new coach aura and the January transfers starting to glue with the team find a goal with leading scorer El Kaabi (who had missed January because of AFCON) and the morale shifts.
7 days later, Mendilibar is hailed as the second coming of Ernesto Valverde: Olympiacos have won their 1st derby of the season by demolishing league leader PAOK away (1-4) and played their best European match so far in Budapest, doubling the 1-0 wins against Ferencvaros. The draw is kind to Olympiacos: the next opponent is Maccabi Tel Aviv, everyone's 2nd preference after Viktoria Plzen.
Mendilibar has already flipped the team morale, won the players, had luck in his 1st match and his 1st draw, and the next week he gets 3 more league wins while rotating the squad. The 9 points gap from the top of the league is down to 3, the fans who were asking for everyone's head are delirious, and the expectations for breaking the curse against Israeli teams (3/3 eliminations) are sky-high.
The back-to-earth reminder is brutal. Olympiacos' shaky defense, especially when not protected by a 3rd midfielder, is torn apart by Eran Zahavi, Maccabi scores 4 goals in 5 shots and leaves Pireaus with a shocking 1-4 win.
The next day changed the course of the club forever: against all odds, Marinakis announces (through press leaks) that Mendilibar signed a new multi-year contract. And when the Basque has a tactically bad match and Panathinaikos leaves Piraeus with an 1-3 win a few days later with the crowd booing everyone, Marinakis doesn't change his mind: the message to the players is that the coach isn't going anywhere, start performing.
Was it their bruised ego? Was it football wanting to reward a good decision over an impulsive one? Was it Maccabi thinking they're already through?
The match in Topola (Maccabi used it as "home") had everyone rubbing their eyes in disbelief: Olympiacos went to HT leading 0-3! And when CB Retsos gifted a penalty to the Israelis, the psychology shifted back with usually clumsy El Kaabi scoring a bicycle kick (!) and veterans Jovetic and El Arabi completed a mircale in extra-time: 1-6!
The draw was again kind, and the opponent in the 1st QF since 1999 was Fenerbahce (note: Greek clubs and Olympiacos in paticular are not afraid of Turkish clubs. In Greece they are considered as "rich but not necessarily stronger than us". I recall Turkish fans here seemed to think Fenerbahce is a club of the size of Porto or Ajax and clear favourites - in Greece they aren't seen like that. It's just the Greek fans and media POV, not an attempt to belittle Fenerbahce).
Until then though, the league campaign suffered a severe blow with an away 90th minute defeat to AEK in a match where Olympiacos was good but not clinical, with only slim hopes remaining for the title. But everyone's mind was in Europe.
Olympiacos entered the home leg pressing the error-prone Fenerbahce defense at every chance they got, and got a 3-0 lead after 60 minutes. But another stupid penalty given by Retsos plus lack of depth which brought fatigue allowed the Turkish team to make it 3-2 and a very close return leg...which started very wrong for Olympiacos, 1-0 down early on. The match "froze" for a big part and in the penalty shoot-out, Tzolakis who became starting GK at the 2nd leg against Maccabi Tel Aviv, saved 3/5, including the 5th one by Bonucci, and sent Olympiacos to heaven.
A rotated side managed to beat PAOK at home, dropped points to Aris and beat punching bag Lamia, and thanks to AEK's poor results vs PAOK, the title chase was also still on, with 3/3 wins in derbies needed.
Nobody was focusing on this: Olympiacos has a lot of titles, they can survive losing one. All eyes were on the prize: Aston Villa and the prospect of a final in AEK's stadium!
What followed was football giving back to Olympiacos what they deserved over the years: a perfect referee and VAR referee who didn't give any "home advantage" to the "big league" team, a perfect finishing night from the striker, and timing, always timing. Aston Villa scored early but the goal was cancelled because on an offensive foul (from the ones referees often miss), and Olympiacos shocks Villa Park in a counter attack with El Kaabi using Cash's heel to beat the offside trap by 1mm! 13 minutes later, El Kaabi doubles the lead with Mendilibar's press doing wonders against Lenglet and Olsen. Villa bounces back though, with a goal at the end of the 1st half (a limping Ortega couldn't follow Watkins) and equalize early in the 2nd half with Diaby catching Tzolakis by surprise. At this point the match reminds the Yassine Meriah-induced fiasco against Tottenham a few years ago, but this time Olympiacos doesn't crumble. Douglas Luiz gifts a penalty, and El Kaabi (who never misses penalties) completes his hat trick. 10 minutes later, Hezze who had never scored for Olympiacos tries a shot outside the box...deflection, Olsen doesn't react quickly, 2-4! Villa press a lot but tactical freezing of the pace and Luiz sending a penalty to the stands send Olympiacos back to Greece with the 2-goal lead.
In the week until the 2nd leg, reporters and English fans had started an irrational hype about Emi Martinez returning....forgetting that Villa needed 2-3 goals and a goalkeeper, even an elite one, doesn't really help much in that.
In a flaming Karaiskakis stadium, El Kaabi says thank you to Podence and Quini serving him a tap in on the counter and Villa has a mountain to climb and neither the stamina nor the morale to do it. Iborra and Carmo dominate the air, Retsos avoids his usual catastrophic error per match, Tzolakis is there when needed, and Villa has more or less the pointless possession that Spain's NT had in the World Cup.
El Kaabi puts the cherry on top with an identical VAR-verified goal: everyone believes he's offside, but a defender's heel keeps him onside. 2-0 and the dream of every Olympiacos fan (and nightmare of AEK and not only) is reality, final in Athens!
The league title is lost against a spirited and focused PAOK 3 days later. The club really wants to screw AEK for many reasons (mostly because of a fat Slovak referee gifting them a win in January in Piraeus) and beat them at home, sending the title to PAOK's hands. The domestic season ends with smiles after drawing Panathinaikos from 2-0 down and securing Europe for the next season.
The final is recent so I won't go into much detail: in an expectedly tactical and close match, Olympiacos made the dream come true in the way that the last 2 months went: El Kaabi goal in 116', dancing on the offside line, and VAR confirms that for the 3rd time he managed to find the millimeters separating glory from defeat!
Olympiacos caught their Moby Dick, lifted a European trophy in a season which was borderline disastrous for several months, filled haters with despair and fans with ecstatic joy and changed the club's history forever.
The golden team of the club, by order of matches started:
https://preview.redd.it/argksj27vq3d1.png?width=1086&format=png&auto=webp&s=ba929943966b48c707dc10dda899b8179e09094f
https://preview.redd.it/nvmla979vq3d1.png?width=1086&format=png&auto=webp&s=c9f1a574583d8fc9968af7f2dd2ae8a4fbd610f7
Rodinei: The best RB seen in Greece for many years, Rodinei is what Olympiacos fans dream from wing backs: a player with the technical skills of a no.10, who fearlessly runs forward and terrorizes opposition defenses when matched with Fortounis. He does leave gaps behind and isn't tactically very aware of crosses from the other side, but if he did that he would be in the Premier League. He almost became the black sheep when Livakovic saved his 5th penalty, but thanks to Tzolakis this moment cost nothing, and it would have been a huge pity for Rodinei. A cornerstone of the triumph!
Hezze: The soap opera tranfer of August was worth every second of waiting. Hezze started running in the summer and never stopped. A tireless athlete with the stamina of a long distance runner, the tactical awareness and tackle timing of a modern DM/CM, who held the midfield by himself every single match until February due to poor transfer planning, who also always has the clarity to pick the prime option when passing. The 22 years old Argentine was a hidden gem who shone very brightly once competent players played alongside him in the midfield, and got his personal reward as well with a goal in the Semi and the assist to the title-winning goal! Several European clubs are greedily looking at him, but there is the feeling that Marinakis is not going to sell him this summer.
Retsos: The most controversial player of the squad throughout the season. Retsos is an amazing CB 90% of the time, with an excellent ball-playing ability which made Leverkusen spend almost 20M for him when he was 18 years old. The other 10% of the time he has brainfart moments which usually lead to goals. In several matches throughout the year, he ruined his own excellent matches by giving an easy penalty or getting a red card or losing the ball where he shouldn't. He also had the bad luck to not get away with any of these errors - almost everything got punished with a goal while mistakes of others didn't end up in goals. This resulted to a lot of social media hate, peaking after the home match against Fenerbahce when his needless penalty kickstarted the return of the Turkish team in the tie. Nevertheless, he was still the 2nd best CB of the team and managed to not let his rollercoaster season affect him negatively in the final sprint, performing flawlessly against Villa and Fiorentina. If he stops the brainfart moments, he will become the best Greek CB ever.
Fortounis: The team captain lived a moment legends of the club were dreaming of. After 2 ACL injuries and a falling-out with Pedro Martins, he proved to everyone that he can make the difference at European-level pace, he can cover his wing back effectively (a chronic weakness of him), he can combine his lethal through balls with playing from the side and not strictly as no.10, and that Gustavo Poyet commited a crime by not having him in the national team (he rated Bakasetas more, lol). Fortounis gives solutions when matches get stuck, he opens the defenses and his creativity is a tool Olympiacos relies on so frequently that it's often taken for granted. He deserved this moment maybe a bit more than the rest. Top assister of the season!
Paschalakis: The starting goalkeeper for most of the season, dropped before the 1-6 against Maccabi. An old style keeper, with a huge body, very good reflexes, but with terrible ball-playing abilities and afraid to leave his line to clear crosses and corner kicks. Which was the reason, in parallel with the 7 goals in 3 days conceded to Maccabi and Panathinaikos, that Mendilibar changed him with Tzolakis. He had spectacular moments when the team wasn't well and there were many threats for the defense and accepted the secondary role in the end of the season with grace.
El Kaabi: Another amazing story reaching its climax. El Kaabi arrived in the summer with a career in Morocco, China, Qatar and one season in Turkish minnow Hatayspor. Noone was enthuiastic about him, and despite him quickly proving how easily he scores, there was still a lot of criticism about his limitations to control the ball and "break" it to the side and the fact he wasn't as technically skilled as prime El Arabi. His month in AFCON coincided with the team failing to score in many matches, and from February onwards he became an Olympiacos fan's dream of a striker: he was there in every single big match, finishing almost every one-touch chance he got: with his head, his feet, even a bicycle kick! He was what was expected from Tiquinho, from Oscar Cardozo, from so many bigger names who have passed from the team and never managed to be at the right spot at the right time as often as El Kaabi. 16 goals in Europe (2nd scorer of the club, in his 1st season!), 33 in total, 11 in 9 matches in the Conference League. 2 against Ferencvaros, 3 against Maccabi, 5 aganst Aston Villa and the golden goal of the final. That's an Olympiacos CF, the one the fans demand and rarely get to see. Clinical, always on the right side of the offside trap, present in big matches, 0 injuries. A player with an unremarkable career became a hero at Olympiacos and his name known in all Europe. What a story!
Masouras: When Olympiacos is struggling, Masouras is always there to fight and give solutions. When the team is rolling, he stands out negatively more often than not because he lacks the technical skills and quality a winger needs. Masouras became a bench player in the last 2-3 months and added his own part in the road to the title, as one of the clubs oldest players.
Ortega: The 2nd Argentine August arrival was the starting LB and had a lot of ups and downs. Tactically he isn't at the level he should be and makes it up with fighting spirit, technique and overlaps. He isn't Hezze, but covering the position occupied by the (hated by almost the entire fan base) talentless Reabciuk for 2 years, he had something rare: time. The bar was so low that there was patience to give him time to acclimatize and develop. As the rest of the team, he stepped up when it mattered and his 1st season in Europe ended ideally!
Podence: The short legend! When he got sold to Wolves, Olympiacos suffered for years, unable to find a winger of his quality. From players who are usesless without open space (Bruma), overweight players (Rony Lopes) to downright joke players (Onyekuru) and players who didn't give a shit (De La Fuente), everyone failed miserably to replace Podence. His return was greeted with joy and he showed why he is loved and was so hard to replace: the team's best dribbler, he improved his weak finishing in England (2nd scorer and 2nd assister of the season), he loves Greece and the club and gave everything he had most of the time (apart from his falling out with Carvalhal), he has a character and and an ego, he wins a lot of fouls, he is a tiny demon messing with every defender. He scored the 1st goal of the miracle against Maccabi, a screamer against Panathinaikos, he served on a silver platter to El Kaabi. Him, Hezze and El Kaabi were the summer transfers who changed the image of the team the first months.
Mady Camara: The less said, the better. An ungrateful, selfish player who believes he deserves to play in a bigger league and a bigger team, reluctantly stayed after Roma (and nobody else) wanted to buy him, chose to try hard only when he was personally interested, and was iced out of the team in January for refusing to renew and get sold, opting to leave as a free agent. Enjoy watching your teammates celebrate from your sofa, Mady!
Ntoi: An academy product, 20 years old, Ntoi was a DM in his youth career and was turned to a CB by Michel last season. He has good and bad qualities, not ready to be a starter for a team playing a high line but giving it all in Istanbul when he was needed in the return leg. He was the 1st bench option at the position for most of the season and he is with Tzolakis and Retsos one of the academy players who wrote their name in the history books with the title.
Quini: In Olympiacos, when you are a more limited player with a role to offer solutions from the bench, you are either a fan cult figure of a lightning rod for blame and hate. Quini zigzagged between the two, and his step-up when it mattered the most was one of the X factors. A veteran RB with a career in Segunda, he was asked to play LB often (thank Richards for being always injured) with mixed to poor results for most of the season. But with Ortega out against Villa, he had to step up for 3 halfs against the 4th PL team's wingers, and step up he did. He managed to limit the threats and assisted El Kaabi in the return leg to seal the presence in the final. Everyone played a part!
Chiquinho: Among the January transfers, he was the less flashy. Unknown to most people, the bar was low given the multiple failures of the last years when buying players from the Portuguese league, he soon proved everyone wrong and was one of the 3 January signings who turned the season around. An all around midfielder, playing both at no.8 and no.10, controlling the tempo and rushing forward when needed, with Hezze and Horta/Iborra he changed the way the midfield worked and turned the tide. He came with just 500k euros!
Carmo: Perhaps a 15M CB is what is necessary for Olympiacos to have a decent defense. Carmo came on loan from Porto in January and showed from his first game that he would be a season-changer. Strong, dominant and confident, he became the leader of the defense and changed the fate of the club. His block in Fiorentina's chance in 121' was his personal rubber stamp to a season his arrival turned around. Porto's asking price is high, but there's hope Olympiacos will manage to keep him. Best CB after Ruben Semedo and without criminal tendencies. He is worth every euro.
Tzolakis: Among so many stories, the one of Tzolakis is the greatest. The 21 years old goalkeeper was second for most of the season, with his performance in a few matches in previous seasons being lukewarm. Mendilibar made him starter before the return leg against Maccabi, valuing his quick thinking and skill to play with his legs and come out of the box when needed, and nobody could image what would follow. The young GK played with the confidence of a seasoned veteran, had flawless matches against Maccabi and Fenerbahce and became the ultimate hero in Istanbul by saving 3/5 penalties! From there with morale sky high, he was a rock until the end of the season, with 2 clean sheets in the 2nd Semi and the Final, and from another young prospect who was thinking of leaving to find playing time, you're looking at the starting GK of Olympiacos for years to come!
Alexandropoulos: The former Panathiniakos youngster on loan from Sporting scored one of the most crucial goal of the seasons: the equalizer against Genk in early August when half the squad hadn't arrived yet. His contribution came in the less flashy part of the season, but it was just as valuable. He didn't find much playing time the last months since Mendilibar preferes technically skilled midfielders and he's a bit clumsy, but if he stays there's a lot of room for improvement.
Horta: A technically artistic albeit a bit soft CM, Horta gave much needed solutions and filled the midfield of Olympiacos with quality and simplicity. Releasing pressure from Fortounis and Podence, sometimes from the bench sometimes as a starter, Horta was another missing piece of the puzzle which fell in place. He also put the nail in AEK's coffin with 2 goals which took the title out of their hands!
Navarro: You can't have 100% success in January transfers. Navarro is not a great goalscorer, he can't do much against parked buses, doesn't have the positioning of El Kaabi or the skill of Jovetic, and it's frankly a mystery why Porto values him at 8M.
Iborra: Extreme makeover, football edition. Iborra in a 4-2-3-1 system looked like a geriatric dinosaur, unable to follow the pace, slow, tired and generally useless. Mendilibar saw something in him though and when he changed the system in a 4-3-2-1 with both Hezze and Chiquinho alongside him, the 36 years old Spaniard turned to a leader in the pitch: calm, methodic, dominant in the air, he was a different player and lifted his 5th European trophy, with significant contribution to it!
Biancone: A rather mediocre CB with no attributes to make him stand out, he played in league matches mostly before March.
Jovetic: The Montenegrin veteran stayed away from injuries, with the correct usage (coming from the bench), and proved his quality: technique, experience and big moment goals, with the 5th against Maccabi his highlight. Everything you can ask from a substitute forward!
Carvalho: A meme player who cost the Greek Cup with a missed 5th penalty, mediocrity and lack of mental strength, a Mendes plant who made a career with almost zero skills to play anywhere above Rio Ave.
Biel: A player completely unfit for the brutal environment of Olympiacos. He rarely managed to show his talent, he cracked under pressure, he doesn't fight back but his performance takes a nosedive if things go wrong. Shipped to Augsburg in January.
Richards: The medical center's permanent resident, he showed flashes of quality, but what's the point if his body is made of glass?
Freire: A wrong transfer from the start, a mediocre player, error prone, not a great match with any of the other CBs, left in January. Night vs day compared to Carmo.
Gelson Martins: A proper winger, with acceleration, dribble and threat to the defense. Not in the European list because only 3 changes were possible in January, but he rested the starters in the league and is a big hope for the next season as long as he stays healhy.
Porozo: Average, never justified the hype, not worse than Freire but his lack of an EU passport led him to being ommitted from the squad more often than not due to league rules, and left in January.
Solbakken and Scarpra: Flops of the season. Came with much fanfare and high expectations, and offered nothing. We're still waiting for a player coming from Forest to be in the "good" and not the "mediocre" or "bad".
Abbey: A prospect CB who came from Reading in January, showed raw talent in several matches and will play more next year.
El Arabi: A club legend says goodbye in the best way possible. At age 37, he couldn't have the role he was used to, but what better way to close his career in the club? His last game was the winning final, his last goal was the 6th against Maccabi Tel Aviv. With 20 goals he is the club's top scorer in Europe, in the top 10 scorers overall, and the most talented all around CF seen for at least a decade. Thanks for everything!
Vezo: A Mendes transfer, probably in a silent deal to bring us the good Portuguese alongside. Didn't play much, not sure what his level is, he is no Carmo though.
Vrousai: Academy player, on loan to Rio Ave to find game time.
Cabral: He got injured at the only part of the season where he could have found minutes. Came as an extra solution for Greece, can't say we saw it.
Brnic: Started the season strongly but with Podence's arrival he couldn't find space in the squad.
Apostolopoulos: Academy player who debuted with the first team against Aston Villa! Mendilibar proved he isn't afraid at the slightest with his debut.
Ramon: I forgot he played. One of our many mediocrities out on loan.
Goals and Assists:
https://preview.redd.it/k5610bxy7s3d1.png?width=1096&format=png&auto=webp&s=cd72b3af7f997c59d998cab2c3eaf2d9f4de6d8b
https://preview.redd.it/t7z0b4d18s3d1.png?width=1083&format=png&auto=webp&s=39883104a48096d10ea8158cce861c9361896342
Future:
Apart from the obvious (the title itself), Olympiacos won the chance to change the next years for the club as well: the direct spot in the next Europa League league phase means a proper pre-season without qualifiers. It means planning without must-win matches in the summer.
The club completes 100 years in 2025 and Marinakis was already talking about the EL Final in Bilbao! Wild, but shows the mood to raise the budget, keep the key players and aim even higher!

New here ✋🏼Thanks to this community I have started seeing results, the tips, the motivation, will keep it up to monitor progress. Have a wedding to attend in July as MOH so want to look my best. ☺️
Posting to continuously keep myself accountable, but also to share my experience so far so other PP moms out there can have some reference as I myself did a lot of search here to find good references to get started.
*Disclaimer: this is specific to my body and I find it’s working well without impacting my supply after a slow decrease in CI and choosing better food source, baby’s height and weight are at > 99 percentile consistently, so grow has not been impacted, please use my experience as reference only, I was very fit pre-pregnancy and worked out throughout so I did retain a good amount of muscle to restart. This amount of calories may impact your supply so please please rigorously monitor your supply, baby’s growth, talk to a dietitian or professional.
Stats: Starting weight of when I started to take things seriously: 140lbs Current weight: 136lbs Current Body fat (US Navy Method): 26.9% NSV: 1) Mommy pouch is reduced 2) fit into some of my old clothes 3) back into the unassisted pull up games Height: 5’4 PP: 2 month Postpartum
What I am following:
Calorie intake: 1500 on rest day 1700 on active day Formal Exercise: Deep core exercises + Zone2 30min treadmill inclined walk + Weight training (Upper, Lower, Full body split), 6 days a week, done mostly at home except for Z2 cardio Informal Exercise: my baby doesn’t do well napping on the go but I try to get in as many steps as possible, ranging between 3000-6000 only at the moment, hoping to increase
I always loved exercising so motivation to get moving hasn’t been an issue, three major changes I made though that finally gave me the result:

1. I kind of ditched HIIT because it makes me very hungry afterwards since it burns more carb than fat for fuel, doing once a week now VS. 4 in the past, since switching to inclined walk at zone 2 heart rate, I find myself feeling great, get a nice amount of steps and sweat in, and not hungry afterwards like I feel after HIIT. Nursing moms know how crazily hungry breastfeeding can make you feel. Z2 burns fat more efficiently. As your HR goes higher, your body draws more energy from carb than fat based on my understanding. I found Mike Diamond on YouTube and he changed my old perception of “intensity = result”.
   
2. Recently I set a new rule for myself - as long as it’s going into my month, I need to log it. I had to be honest with myself that in the past I often snack here and there, and don’t log because they are “insignificant” or I wanted to put my head in the sand. Now with my new rule, I still snack but I choose better options because I know I have to deal with the consequences of logging it and confronting my choices. I focus on low sodium, high protein, high fiber food. Getting 1g of protein per lb of my BW. I plan my food the day before and work my “not so healthy but I really wanna eat” food in there without compromising my protein and fiber goal, and of course, stay within the caloric goal.
   
3. Two points above play a big part in me stopping binging late at night as my hunger isn’t as crazy, I feel a major difference in hunger throughout the day when I do HIIT. And since I am taking logging seriously and not cheating myself, I switch to a cup of decaf tea after kids’ bedtime to curb my late night binging tendencies, which had always been my ultimate downfall.
   

Hope someone find this info helpful and just know even though nursing moms and postpartum moms are swimming upstream against hormonal changes, sleep deprivation, you too can do it!!

if you stand to criticise women on dating apps you are somehow the biggest pos on the planet, and get every one word synonym thrown at you by every unhinged twitter user imaginable.
let’s go through some profiles i have seen recently on hinge:
“bringing me for food, liking hard techno as much as me, and being able to handle me 😁”
okay so the first statement is my own pet peeve, im sick of this shit where women just want to be taken by the hand and led, this is a recurring theme in OLD profiles and im so fed up of it, oh you want me to bring you for food? you want me to create spontaneous plans for you? you want me to make plans, create ideas, do everything, take initiative, you want to be sprung into adventure by external forces??
this all basically means that whether men like it or not, we have to fulfil a role of making the vast majority of effort, and women just have to show up and not reciprocate? did you ever think that maybe i want to be sprung into adventure by external forces? that i like spontaneous plans brought to me? why does everything have to be done in offer to the girl and nothing done for me? why does my feelings, my personality, who i am as a person not matter to you? you only want macho men who are gonna be decisive for you and make it so you don’t have to think.
i genuinely hate this entire thought process in f women on OLD, so many are so riddled with fucking narcissism because of how social media gives them this god complex that they think men have to do all this for them and more and be thankful for the opportunity? if men acted the way women do the human race would die out because women would start complaining about the “ick” of overconfident men.
liking hard techno, that’s an each to their own thing. if you’re into that in your late 20’s / early 30’s by all means do you. i’m trying to find love however and i think the chances of a long lasting relationship with someone at this age that wants that lifestyle are slim as fuck. isn’t that just code for you wanna be on a buzz from gear or drink all the time? whatever idrc about that one cause it’s not my type anyway.
being able to handle me, like why ? why even say this and what’s wrong with you to say this? this is serious narc personality disorder shit. it’s like yes i am admitting i am fucked up, i am doing nothing to better myself or correct it, but you are going to have to be an emotionally balanced individual that can manage my mood swings, poor temperament and arguments probably starting over fuck all squared not to mention the possibility of bpd. i just don’t even know man.
profile 2. not much here other than the incredibly common theme of wanting to travel, and yes i want to as well. but unfortunately i’m from a working class background, im not some posh rich person from a rich family that has went on 3 holidays a year since i was a child, travelling is chronically expensive and a plaything of the upper classes, im sorry i don’t want to put myself into debt to travel, especially when i’m trying to put myself in a position to earn good money so that i have a better life for myself and if i’m fortunate will have some expendable income left over. women have such ridiculous expectations with regards to travel, they don’t realise how narcisstic it makes them look along with how out of touch from the real world. granted hinge seems to draw in all the posh rich folk, they wouldn’t wanna slum it with a working class boy like me.
various profiles after this are a continuous stream of wanting to travel.
next profile, must be 6ft + and have big arms, ok even under ordinary circumstances this is annoying if an attractive girl says this, but the girl who had this in her profile is literally 5’2 and fat???? like how the fuck does that compute. you’re hardly the cream of the crop yourseld and yet you’re laying out conditionals for a boyfriend based on appearance? mental if you ask me, but again, narc.
next profile, girl has children, but also says she does not want children. that’s fair enough and tbh i’m not super bothered by this, it’s moreso just like, oh so you want me to come be a father to your kids but i can’t have kids of my own? and yeah, i know the cope seems to be that “i don’t want you to be their daddy they already got one!” then why isn’t he there? just a ridiculous statement to make.
next profile, convert a van and travel around, again this is funny cause this is another case of upper middle class white women making things whose origins started from you know, people living out of vans because they couldn’t afford to live in a home to, omggg this is so photogenic, or this is a mood!! like yeah hold on till i just up and leave everything to go and convert a van into a space we can live in which will likely cost a small fortune, and then travel around for an extended period of time with no income. what planet do these people live on.
smaller one and more of a pet peeve, “make me laugh” why don’t you make me laugh?? again with this shit of me having to take you by the hand and spring adventure upon you! why does the girl always have to take the back seat and be initiated upon? i actually resent this theme to my very core.
more travelling profiles, south east asia yada yada, “i’m a legend” “dating me is like heaven” yeah that’s why we’re in the bargain bucket aisle of the relationship world trying to find someone heading into our 30’s. narcissistic assholes.
another profile, flew to france on a whim to visit a friend, the time between the idea and arriving was around half a week. still living on another planet and clearly insinuation for, if you’re gonna be my boyfriend, you had better plan and book chronically expensive holidays at the last minute for us!
“moustache mullet combo” like this kinda shit shows jisy how impressionable women nowadays are, idk who or what decides a trend but women’s ability to jump on said trend is fucking uncontested. like i remember before it was “beards and tattoos”
wonder what the next thing will be, i just look to see if you’re conventionally attractive, who gives a fuck about shit like that? it doesn’t matter at all as long as the person looks after themselves. narcissism.
speaking of which, i matched a girl on hinge two days ago, i said i once grew a moustache and my mates all called me freddy mercury taking the piss out of me and i vowed to never grow a moustache again, her reaction? safe to say she went twitter more and wrote a paragraph about why that wasn’t a funny joke, why my friends aren’t funny and that she has a freddy mercury tattoo? i jisy replied ok. but like, is this women now? so invested in the lives of strangers and celebrities they can’t take joke or a laugh? everything has to be taken so seriously now? fucking hell.
another profile, naming a time and a place, why don’t you name a time and a place? you need me to do all the work for you and show all the interest.
travel travel travel travel travel and more travel.
then the women with politically charged profiles, like yeah you seem like really good fun to be around making politics your whole personality.
theatre kids, art, film etc. okay i get it you’re from rich families and i’m not upper class enough to be around you, go take your shitty greyed out photo will smoking a cigarette you probably put out straight after the photo because you don’t smoke but needed the “aesthetic”
my most irrational fear, sassy men, what does that even mean? a man who defends himself? makes any remarks? is passive aggressive? like what
plethora of profiles talking about honesty, like we get it you’ve been cheated on. if anythjng saying you want honesty is a warning signal because you will have serious trust issues that will be a mountain to overcome.
spontaneous spontaneous spontaneous profile after profile. why don’t be spontaneous toward me?
countless profiles of women in a million and one different countries before they’re 25.
trying to do the 30 countries before 30 challenge. what challenge?? is this just something that exists within tbe upper middle class because i’ve never heard of this shit before online dating?
do women not see the problem with this? or is it just the case of you’ve got it too good and don’t want it to change? if some twitter user sees this they’ll quote it like “i don’t want my date to murder me” a handy little sentence to disregard everything i just mentioned without having to address it. like yes i know that happens but that’s such a stupid thing to say, like you know you’re trying to deflect by saying that. that’s why no real discourse happens on twitter and you just want to change the conversation into a hate train on men on start talking about something entirely different.
this isn’t healthy for men and probably women too. but it’s just too convenient to have all the options there in front of you clambering for your attention. going onto your phone and seeing your likes at 99+ and getting that little hit of dopamine. who’s rich enough, handsome enough and is able to meet your expectations of a lifestyle along with meeting all your criteria. whereas for him it was likely just a case of, is she conventionally attractive? yes, does she have kids? no, does she have a job? yes.
men have to be so much less picky in order to find someone. that’s a reality men and women have to face.

He is a pug 12.5 yrs old and he weighs 8.5 kgs. He is arthiritc and a heart patient, has been on diuretics for the past 6 months and since then he has lost of hind leg muscle, leading to constant falls, incoordination and being wobbly.
We have started hydrotherapy to counter this, once every 3 days.
Q- Should I add MSM and glucosamine, since he has started getting weak?
he was coughing a lot since he was 9 years of age approximately, we consulted mutiple vets- at different intervals but his condition was somehow not identified( or probably not there at the time), and was given cough syrups and antibiotics etc.
when last year in september he started coughing more that usual(a lot), and had increased heart rate, we had to rush to the vet hospital which is very far away from our place.
There it was diganosed that he had fluid build up from a slightly enlarged heart, and would need diuretics to treat the same. We were I think very late in his diagnosis as fluid build up happens at a very late stage in a heart disease.
As a result of that, currently he is on these medications-

1. torsemide 2.5 mg x1
   
2. Spinorolactone 25 mg x1
   

as diuretics.
Now earlier, he was fine with this dosage for 6 months, but in the past month, he started coughing again despite being on these meds, I dont want to increase these medications any further.
Since then I started reading up on this condition and found a lot about heart supplements after going through various medical journals, vet videos, reddit posts and comments, such as CoQ10 and home remedies.
Finally, this is what I have started giving him since the past week,

1. CoQ10 (150mg x2)( I break the tablet in half it has 300 mg of ubiquinol).

I know its a lot for a 8.5 kg dog but have seen improvements and it does not have any reported side effects. The tablet also has alpha lipoic acid (100mg), Omega-3 (150mg), EPA (90 mg), DHA (60 mg).

1. curcumin+just a little black pepper(to activate the curcumin).
   
2. flaxseed powder( 1 tsp in his dinner)
   
3. Hawthorn berry extract powder( 300 mg x2)
   

Q- also, I'm planning to sprinkle some fresh dried dandelion leaf in his food to help with the fluid build up, how much should I add?
Q- Should I also add algae based omega 3( for higher EPA values)?
He is on a low sodium home cooked veg diet(lot of veggies, low carbs, pumpkin, etc).
Q-Should I add the lacking ammino acids to him in his diet such as Taurine, L-cartinine, carnosine, argnine?
He also has eggs in winter, since in summers it is really hot as high as (48°C /118.4°F). where I live, and his stomach gives out if fed eggs in summer.

I also give him little cottage cheese for protein( I know high in fat but under strict regulation)
Q- lastly, I have also heard of pimobendan really helps, should I add it?
Your experience and advice really helps, need some encouragement to fight this out with him.
Thank you!